


Home is Where the Heart is

by BabyStepsAreStillSteps



Series: Finding Family [1]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt Neal Caffrey, Hurt/Comfort, Neal Caffrey Needs a Hug, Protective Peter Burke, Reese does not get paid enough to put up with this nonsense, Team as Family, Worried Peter Burke
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-09-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:28:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 51,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23958460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BabyStepsAreStillSteps/pseuds/BabyStepsAreStillSteps
Summary: Peter’s grumpy and visiting FBI agents want to work with Neal, which isn’t necessarily an unusual day in White Collar.Surely Peter’s gut is just telling him there’s trouble because he wasn’t invited to the operation, right?Right?It’ll be fine. It’s one undercover mission, what could go wrong?
Relationships: Diana Berrigan & Neal Caffrey, Elizabeth Burke & Neal Caffrey, Elizabeth Burke/Peter Burke, Neal Caffrey & Clinton Jones, Neal Caffrey & Everyone, Neal Caffrey & Mozzie, Peter Burke & Neal Caffrey
Series: Finding Family [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1923745
Comments: 153
Kudos: 237





	1. The Inch to Continent Conversion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Summer_Meadows](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Summer_Meadows/gifts).



> Hello everyone! I have been bullied into writing this by my baby sister, Summer_Meadows. 
> 
> Peer pressure is real, and she has an unfortunately effective set of puppy eyes and she’s very aware of this fact. She not only bullied me into writing this, but posting it as well, so I hope you like the story as much as she did!  
>    
> 
> 
> /-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/
> 
>   
>  This story is dedicated to all the nurses, doctors, lab technicians, and other hospital workers who are going in to work and risking their lives to save people. 
> 
> Thank you. 
> 
> I know that when you signed up to work in the hospital you didn’t sign up to risk your life on this level every day going in to work, but you’re going in anyway and I am inexpressibly grateful you are willing to make that sacrifice. 
> 
> Thank you to everyone who is still working, you are literally saving the world and we cannot thank you enough.

  
“Oh, come on, Peter, can’t you give me this?” Neal whined as he pushed the door to the office open.

“No,” Peter said firmly, following him in. “I can’t, because if I give you an inch, you’ll take a continent.”

“Oh,” Neal said with relish, “I’ve never tried to take land before.”

“Neal!” Peter snapped. “That was not a suggestion!”

“It sounded like a suggestion,” Neal pointed out innocently.

“Well it wasn’t!” Peter insisted, throwing an arm up in annoyance.

“You -“ Peter started, but cut himself off when he felt his phone vibrate. He scowled at Neal as he pulled his phone out to check the text.

“You were just saved by the fact that I now have something more important to do than teach you common sense,” Peter informed him, slipping his phone back in his inside suit pocket and turning to Diana and Jones, who had walked up to watch the show.

“Diana, I need you to check with Interpol to see if they’ve heard of our cat burglar before. Jones, cross reference the security systems between the clients’ homes, see if they’re the same company or if they had the same installation crew.”

“On it boss,” Diana said, Jones nodding beside her.

“No,” Peter snapped, turning abruptly back to Neal just in time to catch the wrist Neal was trying to slide toward Peter’s pocket to take his phone.

Peter glared at him, and without breaking eye contact, pulled out his handcuffs and cuffed the wrist he held in his hand.

“Hey, Peter,” Neal started to defend, raising his other arm in surrender, “I -"

“No,” Peter said again, grabbing Neal’s other wrist and handcuffing it as well before turning and marching up the stairs to his office.

At the top of the staircase he turned and cocked an eyebrow at his CI, holding his hand out expectantly.

Neal sighed and tossed the handcuffs up to him, watching in exasperation as Peter nodded and went to his office.

“He’s grumpy,” Neal complained to Diana and Jones.

Upon second glance, it appeared they were laughing at him. No help coming from the peanut gallery then.

“You know,” Jones chuckled, “I find when Peter is grumpy I have better luck with bringing him coffee rather than pickpocketing, just for future reference.”

“But I want to knooow,” Neal whined, barely resisting the urge to stomp his foot.

Diana laughed harder.

“He’s doing it just to mess with you ‘cause he’s grumpy. It was a text from Elizabeth asking about dinner tonight,” she told him fondly.

“Oh,” Neal looked up at his scowling handler, glad he hadn’t press his luck further just to discover dinner plans.

“Wait,” he squinted at her, “how’d you know?”

“I read it over his shoulder,” she said easily.

Neal took a moment to be grateful Diana hadn’t gone into crime instead of law. There would have been nothing left for the rest of them to do, and she would have been running the mafia in two years flat.

“Fine, I’ll go get him coffee,” he grumbled, pointedly ignoring them when they laughed and placed their orders.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Twenty minutes later he walked back through the doors, reluctantly dropping off Jones’ and Diana’s requested drinks before walking upstairs with a coffee in each hand.

Neal opened the door without knocking, setting Peter’s cup on the desk in front of him before sitting down and sipping his own.

“You ready to not be grumpy yet?” he asked with a smile as he took a long inhale, enjoying the smell of the coffee he held under his nose.

“I don’t know,” Peter grinned at him as he picked up the peace offering, “I’ll consider it.”

Peter took a sip, closing his eyes as he savored it.

“Thanks, Neal,” he said, taking another sip and visibly relaxing.

Neal smiled. “No problem,” he said, taking a long drink of his own coffee. “So, what caused the mood this morning, anyway? Did Satchmo eat your lucky tie?”

Peter sighed, shaking his head. “No, Reese called me this morning. There’s a group of agents flying in from San Francisco today...”

“Ok,” Neal prompted, “why is that a problem?”

“Well, it isn’t necessarily,” Peter hedged uneasily. “I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want my opinion to influence yours, but I’m just not so sure about them. The main agent, Agent Warner, is some kind of up and comer in the San Fran branch. He’s been following a mob boss for the last couple years. 

He lost his partner six months ago in a sting gone wrong trying to get the guy. He’s coming to New York to talk to us, or rather, to talk to you specifically and I don’t know any specifics but he wants to send you in on some kind of operation.”

“Oh,” Neal stared at him with wide eyes. He tried to think of a response, failed, and took a drink of his coffee instead.

“When do they get here?” he asked eventually.

“In about an hour,” Peter said. “I was strongly advised against telling you, but I decided to do it anyway right before you brought me coffee, so nice timing.”

“Why were you advised against it?” Neal asked, starting to feel nervous.

“Reese picked up on the fact I’m not happy about this and didn’t want me scaring you off,” Peter said, picking at the lid of his coffee cup.

Neal’s nervousness was growing by the second but he tried not to let it show.

“Why aren’t you happy about it?” he asked, not sure if he wanted to hear the answer.

Peter looked at him and sighed, slumping back in his chair.

“Because they came to work with you, not me. I wasn’t invited to the operation and I don’t like sending you in on operations I’m not running.”

Neal felt his heartrate pick up and tried to breath evenly without letting his growing panic take hold.

“You’re not going to be there?” he asked, a hint of his alarm peeking through.

“That’s not what I said,” Peter corrected, taking another sip of coffee. “I won’t be running the operation but I intend to be there. As soon as Warner gets here, I will be formally requesting to join the operation. I won’t call the shots, but I’ll be there in the van at least. If Warner turns me down I’ll cash in my favor with Agent Malik in the DC office and get him to mandate I be included.”

Neal relaxed slightly. “Ok, so you’ll at least be in the van.”

Peter nodded. “I’ll be in the van,” he confirmed, “just not directing the operation.”

Neal took another drink of coffee as he thought about that.

“Ok,” he nodded. “At least you’ll be there, that’s the important part. Thanks for telling me before they got here, I would not have liked to have that sprung on me in the middle of the bullpen.”

Peter nodded his acknowledgement of the thanks. “I told Reese it was unfair, you shouldn’t find out something like that at the same time everyone else does.”

“I’ll try to act surprised,” Neal said, a ghost of a smile on his lips.

Peter waved a hand. “Don’t bother, I told Reese I’m your handler and I think you deserve to know. We can fight about it later. Besides, he has to know it’s what we’re talking about in here.”

“Uh,” Neal looked nervously out the window towards Reese’s office where he was indeed glaring darkly at the both of them. 

Neal turned back to Peter, slumping in his seat in an attempt to be less visible.

Peter looked past Neal’s shoulder to Hughes’ office and smiled sweetly at him. Neal slumped lower in his chair.

“Peter,” he hissed. “What are you doing? He will actually murder us!”

“Nah,” Peter waved off, far too unconcerned in Neal’s opinion. “He won’t kill me, I have the highest solve rate in the office and the replacement head of department probably wouldn’t do as much of his paperwork as I do.”

“Ok, that’s great Peter,” Neal shot back sarcastically, “I’m glad your mortality isn’t in question, but he already hates me!”

Peter rolled his eyes, not taking the threat of Neal’s imminent demise seriously.

“He doesn’t hate you,” Peter assured, but Neal was unconvinced.

“If he kills me, it is your fault,” he told Peter firmly, trying to glare intimidatingly, which was made slightly more difficult by the fact that he was now almost at eye level with Peter’s desk.

Peter shrugged, unconcerned.

“Ok,” he said simply.

Neal’s glare darkened. ‘Ok’ was not the proper response to hearing that your consultant was going to be murdered.

“Peter -,” he started, but Peter grinned and cut him off.

“Relax Neal, for once you didn’t do anything wrong. Hughes will be mad at me, but you didn’t do anything, this isn’t your fault. And seeing as he has the annual budget review coming up that he wants me to do for him, I doubt he’ll get that mad anyway.”

“Those are some famous last words,” Neal told him. “Emphasis on the ‘last’ part of ‘last words’.”

“At least they’ll be famous,” Peter said, laughing when Neal glared at him again. 

“Go,” Peter flapped a hand towards the door. “Get out of my office. Expect an announcement from Reese in about an hour, but until then I think you have a mortgage fraud case to solve.” 

“And to think,” Neal sniffed, betrayed and offended, as he stood to leave, “I brought you coffee!” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I have the entire story plotted out, it just needs a little editing, so I should have the next chapter out fairly soon!
> 
> /-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/
> 
> Thank you to all essential workers, hospital or not. Thank you for going in to work every day. 
> 
> Thank you for making the sacrifice so that people can still get food, healthcare, supplies, and support. 
> 
> I know that most are not going in because you volunteered to, but because your workplaces are demanding it, but you are going in and doing great work and I am deeply grateful that you are doing it.
> 
> /-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/
> 
> If you’re looking for some great White Collar fics, check out my little sister’s work at [Summer_Meadows](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Summer_Meadows/pseuds/Summer_Meadows/works)! 
> 
> Thanks again for reading! If you like the story, I’d love your comments! If you don’t like it, feel free to go tell Summer_Meadows about it :)


	2. A Promising Bond

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who commented and left kudos! 
> 
> Here’s the promised chapter two, I’d love to hear what you think!

"Everyone," Reese called, gesturing for the agents to gather around the staircase to his office where he and several other people stood.

"This is Agent David Warner," he said, gesturing to the man on his left once the agents had gathered round. "He's in from the San Francisco office chasing a mob boss known as Claw, who has decided to extend his empire to New York to capitalize on the shipping harbor.  


He and his team will be working here for the duration of their case, give them any help they need and help them find things around the office. He has authority to pull in our White Collar agents, just email me and Burke if you get pulled off your current case. Ok, that's it, go."

The agents nodded, dispersing around the room to continue the tasks they had been doing before the announcement.

"Caffrey," Hughes' voice cut over the bustle of the office and Neal turned to look back at the walkway above the stairs. 

Hughes double finger pointed at him and nodded toward the conference room, turning on his heel to lead the way.

As soon as Hughes turned, Peter made his move.

Neal took a moment to admire his handler's skill. Peter was good. Impressively good.

He slipped forward from where he had been standing in front of his office, walking in long, confident steps, directly behind Hughes, striding in the door half a step behind the man like he belonged there. The visiting agents would assume he was a high level agent that Hughes had brought in, and allow him to listen in without question. Brilliant.

Once inside the door, Peter slid to the side and slowed his pace, letting the visiting agents move in between he and Reese as they all found their place in the room. 

Peter shifted toward the back of the room, doing a remarkable job of blending in with the small crowd of visiting agents and melting into the background, well out of Hughes' line of sight.

Neal followed the group up the stairs, quirking a proud grin. His handler would have made a good conman if there were a way to separate him from his intrinsic belief in truth and justice.

As Neal walked through the door of the now fairly crowded conference room, he took a moment to discretely study Agent Warner.

The man had dark hair and a light tan, San Francisco had obviously seen more sun than New York lately. He was taller than Neal, just about the same height as Peter. Enough of a height difference to be noticed, not enough to be a serious advantage.

He stood next to Hughes, confident and assured. He didn't look the slightest bit uncomfortable to be leading a briefing as a visitor. He acted like a man who had been repeatedly assured he was the up and comer that Peter had called him earlier. 

In Neal's experience, people who were so openly and brazenly confident and thought they were the best of the best usually weren't, but maybe it was a different case in the FBI. After all, if his branch had put him in charge of the case and flown him all the way across the country to pursue instead of just handing it off to the NYWC, he must be at least fairly good at his job.

Peter was a terrible influence on him. Before Peter ruined him, he would have been assessing the estimated worth of the man's watch and wallet, not his general competence and trustworthiness. Peter had _ruined_ him.

Hughes waved Neal over, and Neal tried not to let his nerves show as everyone watched him cross the room.

"Caffrey, Warner. Warner, Caffrey," Hughes inelegantly introduced.

Agent Warner held out his hand with an easy smile.

"Mr. Caffrey, good to meet you."

Neal relaxed a little under the friendly greeting.

"You as well," he returned as he shook the man's hand. "You can call me Neal, sir."

Behind Warner, Hughes gave a barely perceptible nod of approval at Neal's respectful tone, so maybe this wouldn't be the day that Hughes decided to kill him.

"You don't need to call me sir," Warner waved off. "Agent Warner or just Warner works fine."

Neal nodded with a smile, but didn't verbally respond, anxious to get to the part of the briefing where they told him what they wanted him to do.

"Alright, let's get started," Warner said, raising his voice slightly so the rest of the room could hear him as well, but still speaking directly to Neal. "As you heard, we're from San Francisco, and we're hunting a mob boss. This guy is big, but he's fairly new in the game. He plays things close to his chest, doesn't even tell his people his real name. He goes by Claw. We have several agents undercover, but none of them have been able to work themselves into his inner circle yet.

Over the last year, Claw has been steadily sending people to New York. The people he sends are tight lipped about why they're coming here, but we believe he's either looking to expand his territory or move his territory to New York. Two months ago, he came himself, and this week he's back again.

One of the undercover agents convinced Claw that I am a criminal in New York who has connections. Last week Claw passed word to me that he wants to meet and he wants me to find a forger who can make seven of these municipal bonds," Warner clicked a button and an image displayed on the tv in the front of the room.

He gave Neal a moment to study it before he went on.

"He wants me, the forger, and the bonds to come to a meeting, which is where he'll pay us. We're not looking to take him down in this operation, we're just fishing. We'll give him the bonds, making sure we record the numbers on them, and then we'll see where they show up. Unfortunately, turn around is short, will you be able to make them by tomorrow afternoon?"

"Um," Neal stalled, studying the image of the bond again. "Maybe if I had -,"

"We’ll provide you paper and ink," Warner interupted him. "We only need you to do the actual forgery itself."

"Oh," Neal said, taken aback. "Well then yes, I could have them done by tomorrow."

"Excellent," Warner said with a smile, "that’s exactly what I was hoping to hear."

He picked up a folder from behind him and handed it to Neal.

"I have the paper and references for the bond here, someone on my team will bring you the ink after the meeting.

As I said, you will be going in undercover, but you don't need to worry. I know you're a civlian, I'll be with you for protection. I know that might not mean much to you since you don't know me, but I can assure you, I'm one of the best. I've gone in on more undercover operations than anyone else in the San Fran branch, I'm a perfect shot, and I was the top of my class in martial arts in Quantico, so you'll be fine."

Neal nodded his acceptance firmly, but internally he was significantly less confident. He was exceedingly grateful his handler would be in the van to watch his back so he wouldn’t have to trust it to Warner.

"And this man here," Warner gestured to a blonde man behind him who nodded at Neal, "will be monitoring our frequencies. This is Agent Parker, he'll be running the surveillance van. We'll each have an extraction phrase. Yours is the phrase 'beautiful day' and mine is the word 'intriguing'. Between Parker and I, we'll have you covered."

Neal nodded again, but couldn't think of anything to add. He didn't think Hughes would appreciate it if he announced that the only reason he was ok with this operation was because Peter would be nearby.

"Where will the operation take place?" he asked when the silence stretched on.

"We don't know yet," Warner said, pursing his lips. "Claw will be in touch with me tomorrow morning, and we'll have most of the day to scope it out before we go in later in the afternoon. The response team will consist of mostly my people, but I will be asking for a few of the New York agents to fill in our ranks. We'll have another meeting tomorrow to go over the specifics of the plan, but for now, all we need from you are those bonds."

Neal nodded, tapping the folder against his other hand lightly. "I can handle that."

"Good," Warner said. He turned to look at the rest of the room. "Ok everybody, five minute break, then we'll regroup in here."

Hughes and Warner led the way out of the room, the visiting agents streaming out after them with Peter at the back of the bunch.

Neal walked faster to beat the crowd to the door, waiting just long enough he wouldn't block the doorway before he called Agent Warner's name.

Warner stopped, sending Neal a questioning look.

"I just wanted to double check," Neal said, monitoring how close Peter was to making it out of the room with his peripherals, “you said I'll make the bond identification numbers and give them to you, not forge off a specific set of numbers, right?"

"Right," Warner nodded. "Anything else?"

Neal smiled as Peter hung back discretely just outside the doorway.

"Nope! That was it, thank you."

Warner nodded, and turned back toward the stairs.

Neal turned back to his handler and flicked his nose with a grin, his smile growing when Peter returned the signal with a grin of his own.

Well, Peter's entrance was now perfectly timed, and Neal's part of the mission was accomplished. He made his way down the stairs and to his desk, ready to start working on his latest forgery.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

"Agent Warner,” Peter called, catching up to the man as he came to the top of the staircase.

Warner stopped walking and turned to look at Peter, giving him his full attention.

“Sir, could I have a word?” Peter asked, gesturing toward his office.

Warner nodded, looking confused, and followed Peter into the room, quirking an eyebrow when Peter shut the door behind them.

“Hi, Agent Warner, my name is Peter Burke,” Peter said, extending his hand to offer a handshake.

Warner smiled as he took it, shaking it enthusiastically. “Agent Burke! It’s a pleasure to meet you. You’re a big name, even over on our side of the country.”

Peter blinked, surprised by his apparent fame.

“Oh,” he said awkwardly, “um, thanks. Here, take a seat.”

Warner nodded easily, sitting in front of Peter’s desk, waiting for Peter to sit as well before he spoke.

“What can I do for you, Agent Burke?” Warner asked with a friendly smile, and Peter felt himself relax. Maybe this guy wasn’t so bad.

“I’d like to request to be included on your operation. I’m Neal’s handler, and I would be more comfortable if I could be in the surveillance van as well.”

“Ok, that’s not a problem," Warner agreed. "It would be an honor to work with you.”

He started to stand, but rethought and sat back down.  


“Actually, while I’m in here, would you mind telling me a little about the agents in your office? We couldn't get their files in time to pick who we'll request beforehand.”

"Of course," Peter nodded. "I've got a good group of agents, the best actually," he said, exchanging a grin with Warner.

"That's what everyone says," Warner chuckled.

"Yeah," Peter agreed lightly, "but with mine it's true."

Warner laughed. "Glad I can work with them, then."

Peter huffed a laugh as he stood up, moving toward the glass door to his office and gesturing for Warner to follow.

"Those two right there," Peter said, gesturing to Diana and Jones, who were bent over a desk in the corner looking through a file.

"That's Agent Diana Berrigan and Agent Clinton Jones. They're two of my best. They can do it all.  


They're both experts in art history, speak multiple languages, can identify hacking algorithms and reverse engineer them, and they've studied up on just about every security system out there.  


They're competent, brilliant, and both of them are crack shots. They take orders well, but they can give them just as well if you need team leaders. I'm grooming both of them to be a Head of Department in the next couple years, the only real question will be which office they’ll run."

"Noted," Warner said, carefully studying both of them to remember for later.

Peter nodded, giving him a moment to memorize their faces.

"That woman in the corner there, by the door," Peter said, gesturing to the desk next to Neal's by the bullpen entryway. "That's Agent Emilia Rodriquez. The woman is brilliant. She can find patterns like you would not believe. She is a bloodhound, give her any five people in the world and she'll find something that connects them within a day.  
  


  
If you need any assistance trying to find the link between victims or locations, she's your agent. She's also one of our best with the sniper rifle, I usually have her up top in the nest for armed entries."

Warner nodded. "We won't need assistance finding the players, but as a heads up, I think I'll request she snipe for me on the operation if we have a good enough vantage point. We might not have anywhere to set up a nest, but if we do, I think I'd like to have her there."

"You do," Peter assured. "She's saved my life more than once. She pulls off some truly impossible shots."

"You know Neal," Peter continued, gesturing to where Neal was diligently pouring over a file at his desk. "Next to him is Agent Aaron Seto."

Warner nodded absently as he transferred his gaze to the dark haired man next to Neal.

"The man is a verifiable fountain of information on any medium of artwork between the sixteen hundreds and the eighteen hundreds," Peter said. "He has an uncanny knack for tracking provenances and spotting the fakes.  


He's also as fast as the wind. If you have an op with a pursuit, he's your agent. Two months ago he ran down someone on a motorcycle, he's obscenely quick. It also helped the perp was trying to flee through a market place, of course, but my points still stands, he's one of the fastest people I've ever met."

"I'd like him on my response team, then," Warner said immediately.

Peter nodded his acceptance easily. "Highly recommended. He could outrun me after he's run a marathon, it's so unfair."

Warner snorted, grinning as he watched Peter shake his head in mock-resignation.

"The woman closest to us getting coffee, the one with the light brown ponytail, is Agent Anne-Marie Wallace," Peter said, pointing to the communal coffee machine.

Warner turned so he could see the opposite side of the room better, nodding that he understood who Peter was referring to.

"She knows her stuff about art," Peter said, "but where she really shines is computers and languages. The woman speaks nine languages and she's working on another three. She's also a tech genius. When the Tech department can't send someone up, she's our hacker, decoder, and programmer. She's insanely good at any kind of tech you can throw at her, and if you piss her off she'll explain it to you in a language you don't speak, so tread carefully."

Warner barked out a laugh.

"Noted," he said with a grin.

Peter nodded his approval.

"The woman next to her, getting coffee? That's Agent Chidima Mabena. You might hear us call her Chi-chi or Cheech, but that was a granted permission, not what she goes by with everyone. She specializes in paintings, particularly the renaissance, but she's a certified expert in several other time periods as well."

Warner nodded as he watched the agent walk back to her desk.

"Her second specialization is martial arts," Peter went on, watching her fondly. "That woman could take down Goliath. She had years of martial arts training already going in to Quantico, she's deadly. She's one of my four best in hand to hand combat. She, Jones, Berrigan, and Saunders could have easily become Olympic martial artists if they wanted to."

Peter pointed out each of the four agents, and Warner followed his finger, nodding his understanding.

"Mabena is incredibly friendly but oh man, she can flip the switch and turn terrifying in a heartbeat.

The perps consistently underestimate her, which is a big mistake I wouldn't recommend making. Don't let her bubbly smile and outgoing personality fool you, she's fierce when she needs to be. I tend to slate her in the first wave for armed entries, like I said, her hand to hand skills are awe inspiring."

"Hmm," Warner hummed, considering. "As a heads up, I might ask her to be part of my strike team."

"Good choice," Peter nodded.

"Next up is Agent Jake Ocampo," Peter nodded toward a man standing in front of the evidence board set up in the far corner.

"He's my perspective guy. He's a fair hand at art, he can keep up with any discussion we have, but it's not his specialty. He’s my go-to guy when any kind of gang or mob crime comes up. He coordinates with Organized Crime consistently, keeping track of the crime syndicates and family feuds in the city. If you need to poach some agents from OC, he's the man to ask for recommendations."

"I'll be talking to him, then," Warner said, watching him write something and walk back to his desk.

"He also has amazingly sharp eyes," Peter continued. "You might hear us call him Eagle Eyes around the office. He can pick a perp out of a crowd faster than anyone else on the team, and he can find key pieces of evidence the rest of us would have never noticed."

Warner nodded, considering the agent.

"The human mountain that just walked in is Agent Jamal Saunders," Peter said, pointing to the large man who was smiling widely as he told Jones something.

"He's one of my martial artists, you do not want to take a punch from that man, I promise you that."

Warner gave a wide eyed nod.

"Yeah, I'll believe that one."

"He's physically one of the strongest people in the office, if you need a door broken down, he's your agent. As you've noticed, he's giant. He's six feet, five inches, if you have anything that involves a lot of climbing or scaling walls, he's the guy for the job. He's surprisingly quick for being so big, and he's an expert fighter. He, Jones, Berrigan, and Mabena are the top choices for sending in against violent perps."

Warner gave another wide eyed nod as he watched Saunders laugh loudly and fist bump Jones before making his way to the desk tucked against the far wall.

"In the field, he's intensely capable, but he's also smart as a whip. He's forgotten more about bonds then I will ever know. You bring him almost any bond in the world and he'll know it by sight off the top of his head and know how much it's worth and basic facts and accrual rates."

Warner looked impressed. "We're still gathering intel on where the sting will take place. Depending on location, I may ask him to be a door barrage."

Peter grinned. "Depending on the location, he might just have to knock firmly to take the door down."

Warner chuckled, nodding his agreement.

"Those two getting files from the shelves are Agent Zoe Varma and Agent Joseph Chang," Peter said, pointing out the two agents peering at the rows of binders on the shelves.

"Agent Zoe Varma is our security expert. She knows security systems, locks, guard strategies, and she's amazingly good at spotting operational blind spots. 

Sometimes I run my plans by her even on operations she's not on because she can spot holes like no one I've ever met. 

She also does ridiculously well undercover. We sent her under last month as a security firm CEO, and she nailed it. Two months ago, we sent her under to infiltrate a crime syndicate who needed someone to get them past the security in a house in the Hamptons, and she could not have done better."

Peter grinned as she found the file she was looking for and used it to gently thwap Joe over the head before laughing and returning to her desk before he could retaliate.

"She's the go-to on check fraud and robberies. The treasury trains her on the changes they make to bill security every year, so she's always up to date on anything US Currency related, and does a good job staying up to date on most other major currency systems, particularly the Euro. Security or money, she's the agent to ask."

Peter laughed as Joe returned to his desk across the aisle from where Zoe sat and proceeded to ball up scrap paper and use a rubber band to catapult them toward her head.

"The man displaying his incredible degree of professionalism is Agent Joseph Chang. Similar to Ocampo, his specialty isn't so much art as the circumstances around the art. Don't get me wrong, he knows more than most Art History majors ever will, but his big thing is world history, which can be really helpful for verifying masterpieces or tracking where they've been."

Peter shook his head in fond amusement as Joe made a paper name tag labeled 'Agent Loser' in bold sharpie and set it on Zoe's desk before getting to work on his file.

"He's also specialized in the study of how people fence artwork, and what kind of schemes to keep an eye out for. He's studied a lot of psychology, actually, he has a masters in it. He's good at predicting where people will be and what they'll do next in high stress situations. He's saved my life more than once when he realized a perp was about to snap."

Peter chuckled as Zoe dropped a paper name tag proclaiming 'Agent Idiot' on Joe's desk to match the nametag still displayed on her own desk as she went to refill her coffee.

"Those are everyone's specialties, but they are all exceptional agents. You throw any one of them into any situation, and they'll come out on top. They're all brilliant, adaptable, good under pressure. They've all been undercover, and they’re all in the top ranking of the Quantico firearms assessment. Every one of them is fast, fit, and have excellent reflexes.

With the exception of Neal, everyone in the office passed the hand to hand course in the top three percent, they are more than capable of defending themselves. Any one of them would be a good choice for your operation. My office is only good as my people, and my people are the best of the best."

"Thank you Agent Burke, I'll talk it over with my team. That was incredibly helpful, I appreciate the assistance. We'll email you a list of the agents we'll be requesting."

Peter nodded his acceptance and held the door for Warner as he walked out and made his way back to the conference room his team was in.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

"You finish them?" Peter asked as Neal stepped into the elevator with him the next morning on the way up to the office.

Neal nodded, swallowing a sip of his coffee.

"Yep," he confirmed. "Seven of them. What do you think?"

He held out a manila folder to Peter, who opened it carefully.

"Wow, Neal," Peter said, shaking his head in amazement. "You never fail to impress."

He handed the folder back to Neal, grinning when he saw his partner was preening proudly.

"Don't get a big head," Peter warned as they walked out of the elevator and into the office. "Warner got you the paper and ink, so it's not like you did it all by yourself."

Neal's self-congratulating smile fell into a pout, but before he could fire off his retort, Warner interrupted.

"Caffrey, Burke," he called from the landing outside the conference room. He double finger pointed at both of them before gesturing toward the conference room and turning to walk inside.

"I guess we've been summoned," Peter commented wryly.

Neal huffed a laugh.

"I guess we have," he agreed, following his handler up the stairs.

"Good morning, gentlemen," Warner greeted as they walked through the door. "You have perfect timing."

Neal raises a hand in greeting as Peter nodded beside him. 

"Did you finish them, Caffrey?" Warner asked when they had taken their seats.

"Yep, all seven of them," Neal confirmed, sliding the folder across the table to Warner.

Warner opened the folder, laying the seven bonds out side by side.

"Good work, Caffrey," he said, restacking them and sliding them safely back into the folder. "These look great."

He set the folder aside and picked up the presentation clicker.

"Ok, so as promised, Claw made contact this morning. We'll be meeting in a warehouse. It’s open lots in every direction. The closest we can get the van and back up will be six blocks down, so I hope everyone is wearing their running shoes.”

He clicked a button and two images displayed on the screen. The first was a picture of the warehouse, empty and abandoned. The second was an aerial shot of the warehouse and the surrounding area, which seemed to mostly consist of other abandoned warehouses.

"Now, Caffrey will be going in with me, but I don't have authority to take him off his anklet for this operation. I already asked the Marshals, and no, Agent Burke isn't allowed to unlock it either, if he isn't running the operation.  


This means that there’s a high chance Caffrey will be made at some point along the way, which is another reason why I’m going in with him. I’ll be armed and there to help until the calvary arrives."

Neal swallowed hard as he thought about walking in with a blinking sign strapped to his leg that he worked with the feds. 

Peter would have never let him go in with it on. He would have fought with the Marshals as long as he had to until they agreed to give him the authority to unlock it. 

Neal wondered if Agent Warner had even asked twice, or if he had just accepted what the Marshals ordered the first time.

"Claw moved up the timeline, we'll be meeting in just over an hour," Warner continued, "but we already have all of our specifics in place. We've made a decision on what New York agents we will be asking to assist, they've all been briefed on their teams and their roles in the operations. 

We've requested Agents Berrigan, Jones, Saunders, Seto, and Mabena, as well as Agent Burke in the survellience van. There will also be two deep cover agents. For their safety I’m not broadcasting their names or pictures, but I’ve received confirmation they will both be there as well."

Neal was feeling less and less confident in Warner's abilities as the briefing went on, but at least Peter would be in the van, and five New York agents would be in the extraction teams.

"Remember, Caffrey’s phrase is ‘beautiful day’ and mine is ‘intriguing’. We're going to tape up the microphones here in the office, then each team will drive together to their assigned places. Parker, you're in charge of logging the bond numbers. Caffrey and I will do a mic check before we leave the car, everyone understand?"

He looked around the room and the agents nodded.

"Ok, good. Grab coffee or a bathroom break if you need it, we head out in ten."

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

"Neal," Peter said in an undertone, keeping a covert eye on the team of other agents milling around the bullpen. "I have a bad feeling about this. This is going to go wrong, I can feel it in my gut."

"Peter, it'll be ok,” Neal said lightly. “You heard the plan, it's a good plan. Your gut is probably just lying to you because it's mad you didn't give it any of those donuts Saunders brought in."

Peter could feel the dread growing in him, constricting his chest as he tried to breathe through his rising panic.

"You know it doesn't work like that," Peter insisted. "Neal, listen to me, you _know_ that's not how it works."

Neal's mask fell for a split second, but it was enough. Peter could see he was scared, really scared.

Neal had always taken his cues from Peter, and he had taken this one as well, even if he was trying to pretend he wasn't worried.

"I'm listening," Neal said sincerely, looking Peter in the eye. "I hear you Peter, I do, but I'm not really seeing a lot of options here."

Peter opened his mouth to protest, but Neal cut over him.

"No, Peter, you know I'm right. These guys have Hughes' full support, do you know what he's gonna do to me if I just refuse to help them? Not to mention what he'd do to you if the Head of Department and main liaison is being detrimental to the operation?”

Peter grit his teeth, looking away. Neal was right, he knew Neal was right, but he also knew this was going to go badly. As sure as he was that the sun rose in the east, he was sure this operation was going to go sideways.

"It'll be ok, Peter," Neal reassured, patting his shoulder before he turned to walk toward to the tech agent to get wired up.

“Ok,” Peter said, nodding with fake confidence. “Of course it will.”

He turned to go take his place by Parker to wait to head down to the van, but stopped and turned back to face Neal.

“Wait, you don’t have a pen,” Peter said, walking back over to a bemused Neal.

“What kind of forger goes in without a pen? Here, you can borrow mine,” he said, pulling out a heavy ballpoint pen that Neal had glimpsed before but never seen him actually use.

“It was my dad’s,” Peter explained, “he gave it to me when I graduated Quantico. I’ll need it back after the case, ok?”

Neal smiled as he took the pen, touched by Peter’s unique, intense, brand of caring. Peter may not be one for verbal declarations, but Neal heard the promise that Peter would get him back no matter what happened just the same.

“Ok, Peter,” he said, taking the pen and tucking it securely in his jacket pocket. “Thanks.”

Peter nodded and spun on his heel, making a beeline for Agent Warner.

Neal smiled to himself and made his way to the tech agent waiting with his microphone. Thank goodness for good handlers.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

"Agent Warner, could I have a word?" Peter asked, trying to keep his thrumming anxiety out of his voice.

"Of course, Burke," Warner said, eyebrows raised in surprise. "What can I do for you?"

"You can look out for Neal in there," Peter said bluntly, knowing he didn't have much time.

Warner quirked a grin. "Watch out for Caffrey? I plan to, that's why I planned the operation around me going in with him. I have to say though, I didn’t expect you to be this worried over a criminal."

Peter's dread skyrocketed.

"He's not just a criminal, he's my partner," Peter said sharply. "He may have committed crimes, but he's trying to do better, he _is_ doing better. Neal is incredibly good at his job, but he's a civilian, he hasn't been trained for any of this. He's helping, and it is extremely important to me that he walks away from this operation unharmed."

"Watch the crook," Warner nodded, "I got it."

"No," Peter said, his eyes flashing in anger. "No, watch out for _my partner_."

Warner studied Peter for a long moment before he seemed to accept how serious Peter was about his request.

Warner nodded firmly, looking Peter in the eye.

"Ok, Burke," he agreed seriously, "I promise, I'll take care of Caffrey in there."

Peter breathed out a sigh of relief as he nodded.

"Thank you," he said sincerely.

He turned and made his way out to the parking lot to take his place in the van, uneasily wondering why his dread hadn't subsided at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> If anyone is curious, I’ve posted another story called ‘Visual Aid - Home is Where the Heart is’ with pictures that I’m using to visualize the other FBI agents I made up, which can be found [ here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23987872).


	3. A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

Peter sat in the van, parked and in place, trying not to tap his fingers nervously as he watched Parker set up the audio receiver.

Parker fiddled with a few more knobs and then flipped a switch, bringing the speakers to life.

The first things to come though were the sounds of a car being put into park, then Warner’s voice.

“Ok, so they should be in place by now.”

There was a slight click and Peter heard the car turn off as Warner slid the key out of the ignition.  


“Mic check,” Warner said, sound coming clearly through the speakers.

“Mic check,” Neal repeated, also coming clearly through the speakers.

Beside Peter, Parker’s phone rang and the man answered it immediately, obviously expecting the call.

“We read you both loud and clear, sir,” Parker said.

“Good,” Peter heard through the mics before Parker nodded and hung up.

“Ok, Caffrey,” Warner said, “if you see an opening to ask what he’s going to use the bonds for, take it, but don’t push your luck. If Claw thinks you’re spying for another mob or reporting on him to someone, it won’t be pretty.”

“Ok, noted,” Neal said, “don’t pry, got it. I really do prefer myself un-shot, and I’d really like to stay that way.”

“Nah, Caffrey,” Warner corrected casually, “he doesn’t  shoot people. He breaks them, piece by piece.”

Peter could almost see the wide eyed look Neal was sending Warner.

“Oh,” Neal sounded nervous. “Double noted. No prying, only light asking if there’s an opportunity.”

“Exactly,” Warner agreed, and Peter heard the car door open as he got out.

Neal was a little slower to exit the car, and Peter wished they had two way communication instead of just audio so he could talk to Neal before he went in.

Neal took a deep breath, then his car door opened too, closing firmly behind him as he hurried to catch up to Warner.

“Parker,” another agent’s voice crackled through the handheld radio. “Managed to get some pictures of Claw’s people going in, no good angle on Claw himself, though. Got six pictures total, but there's at least ten inside. I’ll return to the vantage point when the meeting wraps up, it’s too open to stay there long term.”

“Ok, Manser,” Parker said into the radio, “I’ll alert you when to move.”

“Yes, sir,” Manser confirmed, and the radio fell silent, leaving the footsteps of the two monitored men the only sounds in the van.

A heavy door swung open, then shut with a loud clang as Neal and Warner walked into the building. A lock flipped shut with an audible click behind them.

"McDowin, I assume," a man called.

"And you must be Claw," Warner responded.

"That I am," the same voice confirmed. "Did you bring what I asked for?"

“As promised,” Warner boasted. “Myself, the bonds, and the best forger in the business, Neal C-“

“I think,” Neal pointedly cut over him, “that I can introduce myself, thanks.”

Peter clenched a fist and made a mental note to complain all the way up to DC that Warner tried to use Neal’s real name with a dangerous, unknown, mob boss.

“By all means,” Warner allowed magnanimously.

“Hi,” Neal said, presumably to Claw. “It’s a pleasure doing business with you, my name is Neal Calden.”

“You can call me Claw,” Claw said, and Peter heard the slight noise of a handshake.

“And do you have what I asked for, Mr. Calden?” Claw asked in a dangerous tone.

“Yes sir,” Neal said easily, the sound of rustling paper coming through the speakers as he handed the folder to Claw. “Seven municipal bonds, as ordered.”

The paper rustled again as Claw opened the folder and looked at the bonds.

“Beautiful! Beautiful work, Mr. Calden!" Claw congratulated, his voice lighter and friendlier than the previous threatening tone. "Your services are worth every cent, well done. Here.”

“Thank you,  sir. I hope you remember me for future business possibilities,” Neal said, charming and grateful.

Claw chuckled and more paper exchanged hands, this time the payment.

Peter tried to take a deep breath. Everything was going exactly to plan, and yet his dread was growing by the second.

"So what are you going to use all these bonds for, anyway?" Neal asked idly.

"Paying back a debt," Claw answered easily. "Look at these beauties."

"Wow," Neal said, sounding shaken. "That is a lot of guns you have here, my friend."

Claw chuckled. "Yes, arms dealing is where the real money is. I needed the bonds to jumpstart my little operation, but after this they will fund themselves."

"Yeah," Neal agreed. "Isn't it a beautiful day when they fund themselves?"

"That's his extraction code," Peter said urgently, looking at Parker, who was holding the radio.

"Indeed, it is!" Claw responded in the background as Peter stared in horror at Parker, who had done nothing to send in the teams.

"What are you doing?" Peter demanded. "That was his extraction code!"

"Yeah," Parker said, tense and focused on the audio coming from the warehouse, "but Warner didn't give his."

“Does it matter?” Peter demanded.

"Warner specifically told me I am only to call them in if he gives his," Parker explained distractedly.

"Hey, boss," Peter heard distantly from the audio stream as he tried to move past his horror, "what's that on his ankle?"

That cut through Peter's shock and he ripped the radio out of Parker’s hands.

"All units move in! Now!" Peter barked into the radio, checking his holstered weapon and throwing the back door of the van open.

"No," Peter heard Parker say from the radio he still held as he ran. Parker must have grabbed another. "All units stand down, Agent Warner did not confirm."

In the background, the audio surveillance was loud enough to hear one of Claw’s men demand, “He's FBI, did you know about this?"

"No!" Warner insisted.

Peter's rage flared, and he flew towards the warehouse, six blocks away.

"ALL NYWC, MOVE IN!" he yelled into the radio.

"Hold your positions!" Parker responded over the audio of Claw proclaiming, "We're taking him and getting out of here! If you brought this on us, you can stay and deal with the Feds!"

Peter threw down the radio so he could run faster, distantly noting his agents sprinting behind him as they ran out from behind the building he passed.

They were leaving. They were leaving with Neal.

Peter pushed himself faster, outpacing even Seto as he sprinted toward the front of the warehouse. He lowered a shoulder and plowed through the door, unwilling to wait for battering equipment.

The door crashed open after a moment of resistance, and he continued his sprint further into the room, pulling his gun up.

The only one in the room was Warner, staring at the doors on the other side of the room that swung shut with a bang.

Peter resisted the urge to shoot Warner and ran across the building, bursting through the door just in time to see a large white maintenance van round the corner.

He squinted, reading W24 off the license plate before it was out of sight.

"Get NYPD in the air!" Peter barked out as his agents followed him out the door a second later.

"Partial plate W24! White Van, twelve by six by eight! Saunders, coordinate the air trace.

Mabena, get forensics down here and comb through this building, stay here and oversee, I don't want a single spec of evidence missed.

Jones, I need printed pictures of every perp we know was in here, clean up the images as much as you can before you give them to me but do it quick.

Diana, coordinate with NYPD to set up a perimeter, I want officers on every single bridge and exit point, do not let them leave this city!"

They all nodded, pulling out their phones and starting their assignments immediately.  


Peter pulled out his phone, dialing Anne-Marie's number.

"Wallace," he barked into the phone when she answered on the second ring. "I need Neal's tracking data, now!"   
  


"On it," she said, and he heard typing in the background.

"It's been cut," she said a few seconds later, "it's laying in the southwest corner of the lot.”

"Damn it!" Peter cursed, hanging up before she could ask what happened.

"Seto!" Peter commanded, turning to face him. "Get Reese on the phone, tell him what happened. Tell him I'm taking control of this operation."

"Already done, sir! He was out to lunch nearby, he’s on his way. He'll be here any second."

Sure enough, Peter looked toward the road and saw Hughes' car speeding towards them.

Warner walked out to where Peter was standing in the loading bay, obviously having noticed Reese's incoming car as well.

Reese screeched his car to a halt in the middle of the street, not bothering to park, and flung the door open.

"What the hell happened?" he demanded as he strode over to Peter and Warner.

"Warner," Peter said furiously, "let them take Neal. Neal was made, as expected, but Warner did  _nothing_. Neal gave his extraction phrase, but Warner's people refused to move in because he didn't give his. The NYWC were the  _only_ agents who responded. We got in just in time to see the van they shoved him in driving away, partial plate W24. Saunders and Berrigan are coordinating with NYPD."

"Well sorry, Burke," Warner bit out sarcastically. "They had an arsenal of guns I didn’t know about. It was your leashed crook or good agents, I made a choice."

"Well you made the wrong one," Peter spat back, Jones and Diana nodding angrily behind him.

"Warner," Reese said, glaring darkly, "you’re no longer in charge. Burke, you’re running this now, full control. Bring our boy home."

"Yes, sir," Peter nodded, turning in the direction he left the van to set up command central at the Bureau.

“Burke,” Warner called after him.

Peter stopped and turned back to him with a hard scowl.

“I  _am_ sorry your CI got taken," Warner said, mildly contrite.

Peter stared at him, nearly shaking with rage, and turned on his heel without comment. He didn't have time for this, he had a CI to save.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, I’d love to hear what you think!


	4. Silence is Golden

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU to everyone who commented and left kudos, I love you all so much! Your comments were amazing to read and also the motivation to edit this weekend instead of waiting until next week, so thank you!

Peter threw the doors to the bullpen open, glad to see his people were already ready and waiting for him. He waited just long enough for Diana, Jones, and Saunders to follow him in before he began his barrage of orders.

"Saunders, you're point of contact for coordination with NYPD, make sure they have officers on every way in and out of this city, and make sure they have a BOLO out on that van. 

Jones, get me those pictures printed, ASAP. Diana, find out who the undercover agents were and get a hold of them, ask them if they know where they took Neal. 

Ocampo, get down to the warehouse and help Mabena and Seto oversee forensics. Wallace, follow up on where we are on partial license plate W24. 

Rodriquez, Varma, Chang, you're the runners, make sure everyone is informed of any development made." 

They all nodded and he strode past them into his office, pulling out his phone and dialing as soon as his door closed.

"Please pick up, please pick up," Peter muttered as he listened to the phone ring.

"Suit," Mozzie spat angrily into the phone two rings later, "how did you get this number? Did Neal give it to you?"

"Mozzie," Peter cut in, "meet me in the park in ten minutes."

"Uh, no," Mozzie shot back immediately. "I don't take orders from you, Suit."

Peter took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying not to let his panic overwhelm him. He was glad he had made the call in his office, there was no telling how Mozzie would react once he heard what had happened.

"Please, Mozzie," Peter said, openly begging. "I need your help."

"... What happened?" Mozzie asked, not even attempting to cover his unease.

Peter took another bracing breath and tried to push his emotions aside.

"Neal went undercover with a San Fran agent who didn't do his damn job," he said as evenly as he could. "They took Neal, Mozzie, we have to find him."

"They what?" Mozzie demanded dangerously.

"Yeah, I have pictures of the perps, I need you to tell me who they are and where they'd go," Peter responded, a bit of his panic sneaking into his tone despite his best efforts.

"Ok," Mozzie agreed immediately. "I'll be there, the fountain, ten minutes."

"And one more thing," Peter said before Mozzie could hang up. "Do you know any assassins?"

"Suit?" Mozzie drew out in a warning question.

"I can't kill him," Peter explained, losing his hold on his desperation, "Neal would go back to prison, but Moz -" Peter's voice broke before he could stop it. "Agent Warner made a choice, he let them take Neal," he finished in a devastated whisper.

"I'll think about it," Mozzie allowed. "Ten minutes, Suit."

Peter hung up and pocketed his phone, walking back out into the main office.

"Jones!" he called. "Where are we with the pictures?"

"Here!" Jones said, handing Peter a stack of papers as he walked by.

Peter nodded his thanks without slowing down.

Warner walked in the door and raised a casual hand in greeting as Peter walked towards him.

"Hey Burke," he said, light and friendly.

Peter didn't acknowledge him.

"I'll be back," he announced to the room, striding past Warner without looking at him, "I'm checking with a source."

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

"Suit," Mozzie greeted, forgoing his usual encoded acknowledgment. 

"Mozzie," Peter returned, sitting next to him on the bench and pulling out the pictures. 

"Thank you for coming," he said genuinely, handing Mozzie the small stack of papers.

Mozzie nodded, but didn't bother responding as he flipped through the pictures, studying each for a few seconds before flipping to the next one in the stack.

“I’m not finding you an assassin, Suit,” Mozzie told Peter as he flipped through the pictures again. 

“I know,” Peter rolled his eyes, “I’m not actually going to murder him, I’m just angry.” 

Mozzie nodded his understanding and agreement as he studied one of the pictures closer. 

"I don't know any of them," Mozzie said, " _but_ " he pointedly continued before Peter's disappointment fully sank in, "this one does have something." 

He pulled out the fourth picture and set it on the top of the stack. 

"This mark," he said tapping the man's partially visible tattoo poking out of the bottom of his shirt sleeve. “It's incomplete, so I don't know which, but it's either the crest of the Vidmar family or the Cazacu family, they both use the same distinctive border around their family crests and neither are happy the other uses it. 

The Vidmar's are from Slovenia. Fairly new to the city, they run a small drug cartel down in the lower east side. They're not really big players, but they are violently dangerous. Gentlemen cons like myself avoid dealings with them at all cost, so that's all I know for now, I'll ask around. 

The Cazacu's are Romanian, relatively new in town as well, trying to set up shop as a counterfeiting syndicate, but they haven't really taken hold anywhere in particular yet. I'll ask around to see if anyone has heard where they landed."   
  


"Good," Peter breathed in relief. It was a start. "Thanks, Mozzie. Let me know as soon as you hear anything, no matter how small."

"I will, Suit," Mozzie promised, unusually serious. 

"Don't throw away that phone yet," Peter said, standing to leave, "that's how I'll send you updates. I'll let you know the second we find anything." 

Mozzie nodded his approval, standing up as well and holding the pictures out to Peter. 

Peter shook his head. "You keep those, I have more in the office." 

Mozzie opened his mouth to say something, but Peter cut him off. "I know you have perfect recall, but you might need to ask your street contacts." 

Mozzie shut his mouth and nodded, pocketing the photos. 

"What did June say when you told her?" Mozzie asked.

"I haven't told her yet," Peter said, looking across the street to avoid Mozzie's intense gaze. "All this happened barely thirty minutes ago, you were the first call I made." 

Peter glanced back at Mozzie and was surprised to see an approving smile on his face. 

"I'll tell her on my way," he volunteered, and Peter took a breath of relief that Mozzie took that off his plate so he could focus on the investigation. 

"Could you tell El, too?" Peter asked, sending him a hopeful look. 

Mozzie nodded again. "I will, you focus on finding Neal." 

Peter nodded resolutely, clapping Mozzie on the back as he passed. "I will. I'll text or call you if we find something."

"As I will you," Mozzie promised. 

Peter glanced at the street, checking if the cross light was lit, and when he glanced back at Mozzie he was gone, disappeared into the crowd. Peter quirked a grin, shaking his head at the conman and making his way back to the office. 

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Peter tapped his fingers against his leg as he waited for the elevator to take him up to the twenty-first floor. 

Ding! Finally, the doors slid open, revealing... Agent Warner. Exactly the man Peter didn't want to see. 

"Burke!" Warner called brightly. "Successful trip?" he asked with the casual interest of small talk.

Peter walked past him without responding and pushed the doors to the bullpen open.

"Ok," he announced, taking stock of who was in the room as he walked toward the conference room.

"Jones, I need you to get me a full work up of the Cazacu family. Saunders, Varma, help him. Tell Ocampo and Mabena to help when they get back as well. 

Diana, I need you to get me a full work up of the Vidmar family. Rodriquez, Wallace, Chang, you're with her. Seto is with you, Diana, when he gets back.

Jones, Diana, snipe any agents from other departments you need to get this done, anyone questions you, send them to me.

Saunders, meet me in the conference room with any routing info the NYPD has for that van, Wallace bring me everything they had on those plates. Jones, get me a street map of twenty square miles from where he was taken. Diana, I want to know immediately when you get a hold of the undercovers. Ok, go," he finished, climbing the stairs and walking into the conference room.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Hours later, and no closer to finding Neal, Peter excused himself from the conference room.

He needed somewhere to be alone, just for a minute, to let some of his panic out before it exploded out in every direction. 

The restroom. Perfect. Peter pushed the door open and headed toward a stall, glad to see the room was empty. He shut the stall door, letting his mask fall as soon as he felt the lock slide into place.

What were they going to do? How were they going to find Neal? 

Desperation clawed at his chest, and the band around his lungs seemed to tighten, making it harder to breath. 

Peter hadn't studied these people. He didn't have profiles worked up on them, he had no idea who they were or what motivated them. 

The only thing he knew is that they had his consultant, and one way or another, Peter was getting him back.

He took a deep breath and opened the stall door, moving to the sink to wash his hands by habit.

He took another deep breath as he turned off the faucet, rebuilding his mask of calm, collected, and in control as best he could.

The door swung open and Peter glanced over his shoulder as he tore off a paper towel.

Agent Warner. Perfect. Peter's favorite person.

Huh, Peter thought to himself. Maybe Neal was right, maybe his sarcasm did go up in direct proportion to his stress level.

"Oh," Agent Warner said, looking surprised to see someone else in the restroom. "Hey, Burke."

Peter stared at Warner stonily as he dried his hands. He threw the paper towel away and walked past the agent without acknowledgment.

Warner thought they could be _friends_ after he let Neal get taken? After he called him a 'leashed crook' and valued him less than the agents that were trained for the exact situation they had found themselves in?  


  
  
No. No way. When Peter found Neal and made sure he was ok, the second thing he was going to do was get Agent Warner demoted to unpaid intern.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

The next day dawned dreary and overcast, and Peter still hadn't found his consultant. 

He raised his mug to his lips and frowned. He glanced down. Oh. It was empty. Again. 

He had made a pot around three AM and had single-handedly finished it. He glanced out towards the bullpen, glad to see another pot had been brewed as people filtered back in to start their day. 

He sighed and stood up, walking out the conference room door, blinking hard as his eyes adjusted to the brighter bullpen lights. 

Coffee. That was his goal. Get the coffee, then get back to the conference room, and then get Neal back.

He made a beeline for the coffee machine, barely twitching a wave at the agents who greeted him, his sleep deprivation and worry making him too intent on his goal to put any effort into small talk.

At the rate he was going, he was going to do actual damage to his heart, he mused as he poured his coffee, but if that was what it took to find Neal, then that was what he was going to do. 

His coffee mug was full and the first step of his mission was compete. 

He turned to head back to the conference room and almost ran into Agent Warner. Wonderful. 

"Morning, Burke," Warner greeted warmly. 

Peter scowled and brushed past him, barely moving two steps before Warner stopped him with a hand on his arm. 

"Burke," Warner sighed, letting his hand fall back to his side, "this silent treatment is getting a little old, don't you think?"

Peter stood, tense and angry, but didn't turn around.

"No, I don't," he said, his voice clipped and his anger evident.

"Oh, come on," Warner rolled his eyes. "I apologized, can't we at least be civil?"

Peter turned slowly to look him in the eye, setting his coffee mug down as he took a step toward the other agent.

"No, we can't be, and you didn't apologize."

Warner threw his arms up in exasperation. "Yes I did, Burke! I apologized at the scene."

"No," Peter countered, his voice low and deadly. "No, you said the meaningless words 'I'm sorry' at the location you allowed a sadisticmob boss to take Neal, you didn't apologize. Apologizing would imply you had done something, _anything_ , to fix the mess you made. You have done nothing, and your apology is as meaningless to me as you and your career."

"Now hold on!" Warner protested. "One little mishap doesn't make me or my entire career meaningless!"

"Yes it does," Peter said simply, "and the fact that you describe the catastrophe you caused as a mishap further proves my point. 

You are an agent, you are a federal agent. Do you remember what oath we swore when they gave us a badge? I know memory isn't your strong suit, considering I asked you to protect Neal and not even forty minutes later you let him be taken by a known torturer, so let me remind you what you swore to our country.

You swore to the United States of America that you would protect citizens from danger, that you would sacrifice your own safety and well-being for the protection of the American people, and that you would always put the civilians of this country above yourself.

Neal Caffrey is a citizen of the United States, and you failed him.

There wasn't an asterisk in your oath to exempt people who have committed crimes. There wasn't a foot note that said it didn't apply if there were guns involved. There was no addition to say you would protect citizens at any cost, except for if you might get hurt. No, there was no subclause that exempted you from doing your duty on the grounds of you being pathetic.

You swore to protect our country's civilians. You swore to take the risk so they didn't have to. You swore to me you would protect my partner.

You have done none of that. None. You are a disgrace to the badge and the Bureau, and you've proven to me without a doubt that you and your career are useless."

He started to turn back the conference room, but thought of something else and turned back to face Warner.

"You know, I looked you up, and you're not the high flying star you think you are. You've closed how many cases? What's your close rate? Fifty two percent,as of last month. Barely even half. Pathetic.

Do you know what Neal Caffrey's close rate has been since he started working with us? Ninety four percent. He has closed almost every case we've given him, and he has worked more than five times as many as you have.

He has saved countless lives and millions of dollars. He has taken down gangs, mobs, and terrorists. He goes undercover and willingly lays his life on the line to protect anyone we send him in with.

How does it feel to know that the _criminal_ you're so willing to write off is better at your job than you could ever hope to be? How does it feel to know that Neal Caffrey has done more for this country than you will ever dream of? How does it feel to know that your contribution to the Bureau is a fleeting mention compared to Neal's work? How does it feel to know that you and your badge are worthless?"

Warner spluttered in incoherent rage while Peter looked steadily back at him.

"You -!" Warner started, face red and vein bulging in his forehead.

Without warning, Warner threw a solid right hook at Peter's face, but Peter ducked it easily, grabbing his wrist as it went by and using it to pin his arm behind his back as Peter pushed him into the break room counter.

"Just remember," Peter said as he held the struggling agent face down on the counter, "you were the one that wasn't happy with the silent treatment."

Peter released him, picking up his coffee mug again and turning towards the conference room, coming face to face with the entire bullpen of agents staring at him.

Peter only paused for a split second before he was moving again, striding past the rows of desks and up the stairs, calling over his shoulder, "Jones, Diana, there's some trash by the coffee pot that might need to be taken care of," before he strode into the room and shut the door.


	5. Finding Direction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you SO much to everyone who left comments! I love and appreciate all of them!!

Diana sighed as she watched her boss pace in front of the evidence board they had hung up in the conference room.

He had shut the blinds, but Diana's desk was far enough against the wall that there was a discrete corner square of the glass the blinds didn't cover.

He moved to the other wall, staring at the city map they had taped up on the board with pushpins in the places of interest.

He looked tired. Exhausted, stressed, desperate. She sighed again, looking down at the case file she was working on.

Neal’s face stared back at her, bright and happy, everything she knew he wasn't right now.

She rubbed the bridge of her nose as she tried to think of any new angle they hadn't seen yet.

She looked back in the conference room. Peter had paced back to stare intently at the evidence board again.

He hadn't left since Neal had been taken. He hadn’t slept besides the three hours Elizabeth had managed to force him to the day before. He stayed in that room almost around the clock, only eating when she or Jones made him.

The elevator dinged and she looked up. Maybe it was Jones, back with the food for Peter. It was his turn to force the boss to eat, but he might need back up. With every hour Neal was gone, Peter got more stubborn, something she hadn't thought was possible.

It wasn't Jones that stepped out of the elevator, but Elizabeth.

Diana sighed again, this time in relief. If anyone could stop Peter from driving himself into the ground, it was her.

Elizabeth smiled wanly at the agents around the room, but didn't stop to talk, instead making her way directly to the conference room her husband had occupied for the past three and a half days.

Diana watched the other agents peer at the blinds, trying to see through them, disappointed they wouldn't know what happened in the room. Diana wondered if she should mention the blinds blind spot she had.

No, she eventually decided. Then Peter would know, and she wouldn't have any other way to make sure he didn’t work himself into the ground.

She couldn't hear through the glass, but she didn't need to hear to see the way Peter's shoulders lowered in relief when he saw Elizabeth.

Elizabeth walked toward him and he crumpled into her hug, face buried in her shoulder as he squeezed her tight.

Diana looked down, trying to ignore the lance of pain she felt as she watched her boss break.

"Where are you, Neal?" she whispered to the picture in her file.

The elevator dinged again, and this time it was Jones.

Diana caught his eye as he walked out, beckoning him over before he delivered the food.

He got the message and made a beeline for her, standing behind the desk so it would seem like he was looking over the file she had open but could still keep an eye on the conference peephole.

He had been the only agent she had told about it, and they used it to keep track of their boss when he was spiraling on particularly difficult cases.

"Oh," he said softly as soon as he stood at her back.

She glanced in the room again, a lump in her throat growing as she watched Peter shake and shudder into El's shoulder.

"Yeah," she said sadly, making room for Jones to set the food on the edge of her desk.

He pulled the spare chair over and fell into it, some of his own exhaustion showing.

"What are we going to do, Di?" he asked plaintively, desperate for reassurance and guidance.

She took a deep breath and looked between her boss and Jones then back down at the file. She straightened her shoulders and used her desperation to light the fire of her determination.

"We're going to find him," she said, firm and sure.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Twenty minutes after she made her way to the conference room, Elizabeth's phone buzzed.

She glanced at her husband before she pulled it out. He was sitting beside her, slumped and exhausted, staring at the map of New York that had been taped up.

She sighed and looked down at her phone.

'One new text from Diana'.

Huh. She opened the text, reading 'Jones is back with food for Boss, let us know when we should bring it in."

Elizabeth smiled. She liked all of Peter's team, but Diana and Jones were two of her favorites.

"Hon," she said, breaking his attention from the map, "are Diana and Clinton ok to come in with food?"

Peter's lips twitched up in an exhausted smile.

"Might as well," he said, shaking his head in fond amusement as he turned back to the evidence, "telling them no doesn't actually stop them, it just delays them by about five minutes."

"Well," she smiled as she tapped out an affirmative reply, "maybe that's because they know how stubborn you are."

"Me, stubborn?" Peter asked, his attempt at pseudo innocence falling flat.

"Yep," she confirmed as the door opened to admit the two agents.

El took a moment to study them while they looked anxiously at their boss. 

They may have slept more recently than Peter, but Diana and Jones also had an exhausted slump to their shoulders and a slightly hopeless look in their eyes.

"We got you two choices," Jones told Peter, "chicken and broccoli or chicken lo mein."

Peter opened his mouth, probably to protest, but Diana cut him off.

"Nope, boss, you have to eat. We got you two choices, and I know you like both of them, so pick one."

Peter rolled his eyes, but sent them both a wry grin. 

“Thanks," he said, "I’ll take the chicken and broccoli."

“Perfect!” El chirped, hoping to infuse her husband with some of her energy. “I love lo mein.”

Diana and Jones distributed the food, taking the seats directly across the table from the Burkes.

“So you’re looking into both of the families?” El asked, watching her husband stir his chicken and broccoli around without actually eating any. Maybe if she distracted him, his muscle memory would take over and he’d eat automatically.

Peter nodded, setting his chopsticks in the container so he could point to two walls of the conference room.

“Yeah, there’s the one for Cazacu family,” he twisted to point to the other, “there’s the one for Vidmar family.”

He sighed, picking his chopsticks up and eating a piece of the broccoli.

“There’s no guarantee it’s one of them though, those are just our best guesses,” he told her as she studied the two walls.

He despondently plucked another piece of broccoli out of his box and ate it absently, staring at the Vidmar wall.

“We’ve got a lot on both families,” Diana said, trying to inject some confidence into her voice as she watched Peter sadly.

“Yeah,” Jones agreed, following Diana’s lead. “We’ve managed to track down a list of assets for both families. The list is long for both, which is bad, because we don’t want to bust into one and risk scaring them off if he’s actually at another, but good because we have a lot of promising possibilities.”

El nodded, chewing her lo mein thoughtfully.

“What kind of businesses do they have?”

“Well,” Jones said, setting his drink down so he could point at various pictures on the wall, “the Cazacus have a bakery that they run their money laundering out of, a coffee house that is apparently actually legitimate, a newly purchased shipping dock, an office building we only know the general location of, and a small department store chain that we suspect is a front for fencing contraband past security checkpoints.”

“The Vidmars have quite the list too,” Diana nodded, waving vaguely at the wall Peter was staring at. “They also have a newly purchased shipping dock, a few restaurants, a book printing operation we only know a general area of, a meat packing plant which is listed under the wrong address but we’re tracking the right one down, and a seemingly legitimate fishing business.”

"What did you find on that lead you checked out this morning?” El asked, prodding Peter back into the conversation.

“Well, they were definitely there,” Peter said, tiredly skewering a piece of chicken with a chopstick rather than try to pick it up with both. “Mozzie was on the money on that. Still no word on who rented the office building, but we’re hoping to get results back soon, even if it is just an alias. We found the pen I gave Neal, but it was just the casing, the spring and ink were gone.

We found the maintenance van, abandoned. They ditched the plates, but it’s definitely the one they had him in, the ink stick from the pen was shoved under one of the seats. Neal must have slid it under there during the drive, he’s always been quick on his feet."

Peter tiredly nibbled on the chicken he had stabbed with the chopstick as he stared at the pictures on the wall.

“Did you get any other clues from the building or the van?” El asked, distracting Peter from slipping back into his frustrated exhaustion.

“Well, with the engine VIN number, we could trace the van to the last auto shop it was in, and they poured through their records and got us two names. They’re aliases, but I gave them to Mozzie, he’s tracking down everyone who makes fake identities in New York to see if they have a real name for us or at least a description."

He sighed and plucked a piece of broccoli out of his box and chewed it slowly before he went on.

"We ran a check on the engine, it had been driven two hours before we found it, but less than twenty miles, which tracks with the building we found, fourteen miles away. Rodriquez is pouring over traffic cams, but they chose the area well, I don’t really think she’ll find anything, and they ditched the license plate, so it won’t flag any automatic algorithms even if they did drive on a monitored road."

He despondently speared another piece of chicken, shrugging as looked at her.

"It is good, though,” he went on, “because it means that they’re not long gone. If they did leave the city, it was extremely recent, not days ago, so that raises the chances of Mozzie hearing chatter on the street."

She nodded as he ate the piece of chicken, tiredly staring at his box as he stirred the rest of his food with the other chopstick.

“I keep going back to the office, though,” Peter said, turning his attention back to El and nodding his head toward the wall devoted to crime scene photos and maps of the surrounding area. “It’s the key to this whole thing. There’s something there. I know it, I can feel it, but I just can’t... I can’t see it.”

“You will,” El said confidently, rubbing a hand down his arm.

“In time?” he asked, and El could hear the desperation under his tone.

“Yes,” El told him firmly.

He glanced back at his food, unconvinced, spearing another piece of chicken.

"So Mozzie's been helping?" El asked, using her chopsticks to snag a piece of broccoli out of Peter's box.

"Yeah," Peter tried to smile. “He hasn't even been throwing out ridiculous quotes, which is a nice change. He didn't even stop doing that when they took -"

Peter's eyes went wide and his mouth opened in a silent 'oh' as an epiphany hit him.

"- Gina!” he finished, springing to his feet with an excited light in his eyes. He swung around to look at Jones and Diana.

"Get me a forensics kit!” he ordered with more energy than El had seen from him in days.

Peter turned back to his wife, swooping in to give El a kiss on the cheek.

“El, you’re a genius!" he told her, nearly vibrating in excitement. "That’s it, that’s what I was missing, yes! Jones, Diana, get Ocampo, we need to go back to the office building! Thanks, hon!” he called, racing out the door.

El exchanged a smile with the other two agents.

“It looks like my work here is done,” she said wryly. “Text me if you need help corralling him.”

“We will,” Diana smiled, her boss’s excitement contagious. “Thank you, Elizabeth. I’ll text you, one way or another, what we found.”

Diana quickly closed her box of food and followed Peter to the door.

“Jones," she said, turning back to look at him before she walked through the doorway, "I’ll grab Ocampo, you get the kit. We’ll each drive our own cars in case we find something at the scene we need to split up for.”

Jones nodded and she rounded the corner out of sight.

“Elizabeth,” Jones said, gathering up his food to follow Diana out the door, “you’re a life saver, we couldn’t have sparked that without you, not to mention, I had no idea how we were going to get him to eat anything.”

Jones smiled at her and followed the other two out of the room at a jog.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“When Gina de Stefano was kidnapped, she used her fingerprints to leave a message,” Peter announced to the three agents behind him as he strode into the building and down the hall. “I think Neal did the same thing. That’s why he left the pen so specifically.”

He turned to Ocampo as they walked into the office where they had found Neal’s DNA.

The kidnappers had been careful, not a single piece of anyone else’s DNA had been found, but evidently they had to evacuate too quickly to completely wipe down the room they had kept Neal.

“Here,” he said, tossing Ocampo an office pen he had grabbed on his way out of the bullpen. “You were here with the forensics, do you remember exactly where the pen was found?”

Ocampo nodded, walking across the room to point at the floor.

“Yeah, it was right here, by the crack in the floor.”

He squatted next to it and carefully laid the pen down before standing up and turning back to Peter.

“It was just like that,” he said, gesturing to the pen on the floor.

Peter nodded, walking past the pen to the wall it pointed to.

“Ok, I need the fingerprint brush,” he said, and Jones immediately dug through the kit to hand it to him.

Peter nodded his thanks as he brushed the wall, starting at a point around his bellybutton and brushing outward in widening circles as he went.

Nothing. There was nothing.

Peter shook his head, expanding his circles until he had dusted from the floor to as high as he could reach, and _still_ no clues had been revealed.

No, he shook his head again as his panic grew, there had to be something. He could feel it, he could _feel_ this was the answer, so where was the clue?

“Peter,” Ocampo interrupted his growing desperation, “can I have the brush? There’s something weird about this part of the wall.”

Peter wordlessly handed it over, watching silently as Ocampo dusted a low section of the wall a few feet away.

Ocampo pulled the dust away to reveal a... a handprint. Neal’s handprint. That wasn’t helpful. They already knew he was in here, why was Peter’s gut screaming that dusting would find them a clue?

Peter closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to calm his panicked thoughts. He took another deep breath and opened his eyes again, feeling marginally calmer.

Ok, from the top then.

“Is the pen exactly where it was?” he asked, trying hard not to snap at his agents.

Diana nodded, holding up the pictures she had been prepared enough to bring with her for reference.

“Yeah,” she said, looking between them again. “That crack in the tile is pretty distinctive. Right by where it juts out, right there.”

Peter nodded and took another deep breath.

Ok, next step then. Maybe they missed.

He stood directly over the pen, a foot on each side. The wall directly in front of him was dusted from floor to as high as Peter could reach. Peter was taller than Neal, would anything be above that?

He cocked his head, considering if he should find a chair to stand on to dust higher and froze.

He slowly turned around, distantly registering the other three intently examining the dusted wall for missed clues.

With his back to them he saw another wall. An undusted wall.

In a haze he walked towards it, the pessimistic side of him noting how far the wall was from the pen and doubting the likelihood that there would be anything there except more disappointments.

To cause even more doubt, this wall wasn’t open and available like the one his three agents were still studying. This one had a filing cabinet in front of it, just big enough to be inconvenient to reach over to leave a message on the wall.

Peter stopped in front of it and something in the back of his mind urged him to look down.

He felt a small spark of hope growing as he stared at it. Something was here. He knew it, but _what_?

He pulled gloves out of his pocket and put them on, still staring at the cabinet before him.

He dropped to a knee in front of it, carefully studying the metal handles. That wasn’t it, they all had a thin coating of dust on them, there was no way someone opened them less than a day ago....

Maybe there was a note under it?

Before he could fully bend to peer underneath he froze, staring at the corner that had caught his eye and waiting for his brain to explain why he felt an explosion of victory at the sight.

Something, something about this corner, the front left corner, was the answer, but Peter was having trouble pushing his sleep deprived brain into action.

Oh. _Oh_. Oh!

Peter sprang to his feet, a smile splitting across his face.

“This has been moved!” He announced to the other three. “Someone with gloves get over here and help me move it out!”

Diana glanced at Jones’ gloveless hands and Ocampo’s arms full of forensic kit and stepped forward to help Peter.

They carefully pulled it forward, mindful of evidence they might trample if they blindly shoved it out of the way.

There! A slight discoloration on the wall.

Peter held out a hand for the fingerprint dusting brush. Jones grabbed the brush Ocampo held out to him and dropped it in Peter’s hand.

Peter dusted the area with baited breath, pulling his hand back to reveal words.

‘Warehouse printing operation - Slovenian’.

Peter almost collapsed in relief. This was it. This was the piece they’d been missing.

As usual, Peter held most of the puzzle, but Neal slid the final piece into place, doing his part of the partnership even while being kidnapped for days.

“This is it,” Peter breathed.

“This is it,” he repeated, louder, turning to face the other three.

“Ok,” he continued, his mind spinning to put together a plan. “We know a five mile radius their printing warehouse could be in, but it’s surrounded by other warehouses, so it’s not that many actual buildings to check. The four of us are going to meet at the northeast corner of the radius, everyone know where that is?”

He paused for a second to make sure they nodded.

“Ok. We need to narrow it down. Jones, on the way, call Mabena and Seto. Tell Mabena to go through every building on the north perimeter. Find out who owns them or if they’re abandoned, flag the ones with blocked information. Tell Seto to do the same with the second street from the north border.

Ocampo, tell Saunders to do the same with the third, Wallace the fourth, and Varma the fifth.

I’m telling Chang to do the sixth, and Rodriquez to do the two streets on the southern perimeter border.

Diana, you’re coordinator. Everyone will call you with a list of the unlisted owners, and you’ll pass that on to us when we meet on the north east corner. Ok, everybody go.”

Finally, _finally_ , after days of searching they had something.

‘Found clue, tell more soon,’ he tapped out quickly as he jogged to his car, sending the text to both Elizabeth and Mozzie in a combined text thread so he didn’t need to waste time texting updates to both. He’d call them with the details after he passed along his instructions to Chang and Rodriquez.

He unlocked his car and slid in, throwing it in to drive immediately and pulling out onto the road.

Without looking away from the road, he pushed the command button on his dashboard.

“Call Chang,” he said loudly and clearly, nodding as the phone’s ringing came through the speakers.

They were on the right track, he could feel it. Now all he had to do was get there in time.


	6. Springing into Action

Peter pulled up to the meeting spot at two o’clock, on the dot.

He was the first one there, but only by a few seconds, his agents pulling up behind him to line the street.

“Diana, what do we have?” he asked as soon as her door opened.

She glanced down the street to make sure the others were close enough to hear her as they walked up and turned back to Peter.

"There are seven unlisted warehouses, but five of them are in the same row, three streets down from the north border. The four on the east border, and then one the second from the west.

The sixth one is on the east border as well, sixth street down, and one is in the middle of the southern line.”

Peter nodded, laying them out in his head.

“Ok,” he said decisively, “that’s not that many, we’ll walk them together. We’ll start on the third street and then work our way around the perimeter.”

The agents nodded their acceptance and Peter cast a speculative look at the cars.

“Jones, you have the biggest car, you’ll drive us all a block away from the east border of the third street. If there’s trouble, I want at least one of our cars close.”

Jones nodded and led the way to his SUV, parked behind Diana’s car.

Peter slid into the passenger seat as soon as Jones unlocked the door, Diana and Ocampo getting into the back.

“We’ll walk the row,” Peter repeated, “call out what you find, but be subtle about it, we don’t want to spook them. They haven’t seen any of us, we’ll pretend we’re heading back from a late lunch if anyone stops us. We work in the factory on the end of row three, the one that puts aglets on shoestrings. Agreed?”

He glanced into the rear view mirror at the two in the back, then to Jones when the other two nodded.

Jones nodded as well, putting the car in park and killing the engine.

"Leave the suit jackets in the car," Diana said, shrugging out of hers and setting it on the seat between herself and Jake. "We're factory workers, not office workers."

The others nodded, shrugging out of theirs as well.

"Lose the ties," Jones added as he pulled his off.

Peter loosened his and pulled it over his head, dropping it carelessly on his jacket, checking to make sure Ocampo had taken his off as well.

“Here we go,” Peter said, leading the others out of the car.

They walked the block separating them from the perimeter of buildings, crossing the street while their eyes scanned the first warehouse on the street.

“Boss,” Diana said in an undertone, “relax. You’re throwing off tension like a glowing beacon, no one’s going to believe you’re a worker heading back from lunch.”

Peter nodded tightly, releasing a breath and trying to will the tension out of his shoulders.

“Try again,” Jones grinned lightly.

Peter scowled at him, but he could feel a smirk growing at the teasing, and his muscles uncoiled from where they had been held tight for days.

“There ya go,” Ocampo congratulated with a smile and a mocking pat on the shoulder.

Peter chuckled, shoving him lightly.

“Whatever,” he muttered, carefully studying the windows as they passed the first potential warehouse.

“The gravel is going to make things harder,” Diana noted a few seconds later, subtly scanning the walkways from the street to the building and the gravel that had been filled in around them in lieu of grass or landscaping.

“Yeah,” Jones agreed distractedly, glancing at the chain link fence that ran along the property line.

“No one has been in that one recently,” Ocampo said quietly. “There’s a spider web across the first doorway, and the second one has a bird's nest built on the hinges. No way that would stay up when the door moved. Likelihood of workers only going in through the back is low.”

Peter nodded and focused his attention on the building they were walking up to.

“If they really thought they were keeping a prisoner here for a few days, they probably wouldn’t leave so many of their windows broken,” Diana said under her breath, just loud enough for the men around her to hear. “I counted eight broken on the side, twelve total on the front, nine of which are on the ground floor. Too easy for someone to slip out, not to mention, it makes it significantly less soundproof.”

Peter nodded again, continuing past to the third building.

They walked in silence, looking for anything that might be helpful.

Nothing, one way or another. Peter sighed, continuing past the third one and on to the fourth.

His sleepless brain was trying to tell him something again, and he wasn’t quite sure what.

It was something about the third warehouse.

He stopped and turned back to face it, cocking his head.

His agents noticed almost immediately, stopping and turning more discreetly than he had.

“Find something boss?” Diana asked, helpfully standing with her back to the warehouse so they had an excuse to stare in that direction.

“I don’t know,” Peter said slowly, walking back towards it. “I think....” he trailed off, looking at the empty windows.

“I think you need a nap,” Diana informed him, finishing his trailed off sentence.

He grinned, shoving her shoulder as he walked by, making her laugh.

“Enough, you,” he scolded teasingly, relaxing as his team chuckled.

There. By the path, there was something there. Peter stared uncomprehendingly, trying to figure out what had caught his eye.

“There’s something by the path,” he informed the others, squinting as he tried to understand why that particular patch of gravel was pinging his senses so strongly.

“Ok,” Jones nodded, reaching into his back pocket to take out his wallet.

Peter watched him, momentarily distracted from the gravel conundrum.

Jones slid a crumpled receipt out from behind the credit cards, holding it up to the group, and tapping it a few times as if showing them something on it.

Peter looked at him in blank confusion. What was he supposed to be getting out of that?

Jones offered the receipt to him, but before Peter could take it, Jones let go and the receipt flew over the fence, carried by the wind to almost the exact spot Peter had been studying.

Peter grinned at Jones.

“How clumsy of you,” he noted lightly.

Jones nodded, shrugging. “Yeah, could you get that for me?”

Peter nodded, his smile growing. He eased the gate open, it hadn’t even been latched, just pulled closed. Perfect.

He squatted next to the receipt, scanning the ground as he reached for the paper.

There! That was the thing that he’d noticed without realizing. He picked up the receipt and a small spring glinting in the sunlight, turning back to the others victoriously.

A door crashed open behind him and he turned to see a large, angry man storming towards him.

“What are you doing?” the man demanded.

Peter raised his hands in surrender, subtly shifting the spring behind his thumb so it wasn’t visible.

“Sorry man,” he said, stepping back. “My buddy dropped his receipt, and we didn’t want to just leave trash all over your lot, you know?”

He held out the receipt as proof when the man glared suspiciously.

The man’s eyes flicked to the receipt Peter held, then to the sheepish looking Jones.

“Where are you headed?” he asked, but his tone was noticeably less aggressive, so Peter let himself quirk a grin as he nodded down the street.

“Just heading back from lunch, we work at the aglet factory down the street. Our boss is trying out this new swing shift,” he added, rolling his eyes, “it somehow benefits the company if they make us wait until one thirty to take our lunch hour.”

The man relaxed, laughing as well.He shifted his stance and the edge of a tattoo was just visible above the collar of his shirt. A tattoo with a very familiar pattern. 

“Yeah,” he continued with an easy smile, oblivious to Peter’s realization, “management, man. Notice they never move _their_ lunch break later.”

“Right?” Peter asked, sounding vindicated. “That’s what I said!”

The man chuckled again.

“Sorry man,” he said. “We’ve had trouble with vandalism, thought you were messing around.”

“All good,” Peter waved off easily. “I get it. We’d better be heading back, our boss will take it out of our check if we’re late.”

“Better get going,” the man said, nodding his understanding.

“Later,” Peter called, turning back to the group and slipping back out the gate.

“Here,” he said, handing the receipt back to Jones as they continued their walk down the street.

They walked all the way to the end of the row before they dropped the made up conversation they’d kept up in case they were followed.

“We’re clear,” Diana muttered.

“Yeah,” Ocampo agreed.

“Ok,” Peter said, “we’re going to skirt the perimeter to the north, head back to the cars, I’ll drive Jones to his.”

The other three nodded as they turned north.

“Good thinking, Jones,” Peter praised.

Jones nodded his thanks but quickly refocused.

“What’d you find?” he asked Peter.

Peter grinned at the other three. He opened his palm to show them the spring.

“This is it,” he said, absolutely certain.

“Is that -,” Diana started to ask.

“Yep,” Peter nodded, his smile growing. “It’s the spring from the pen I gave him. I would know it anywhere, it’s the same one.”

They turned toward their cars, walking the northern perimeter.

“And,” he continued, his excitement growing by the second, “I saw the edge of a tattoo just above his shirt collar. It had the same border as the tattoo in the recon picture.” 

His excitement spread to his agents, hope dawning after so many desperate days, and they exchanged bright smiles and fist bumps. 

“Diana,” Peter directed, “get me a warrant for that warehouse. Jones, run through everyone connected to the Vidmar family, see if you can find who that guy is. Ocampo, you’ll take the spring and log it into evidence. Meet back at the office,” Peter finished, dropping the spring into Ocampo’s hand.

They nodded, striding up to their cars and pulling away as soon as they got in.

Peter unlocked his car, driving to Jones’ car, feeling better than he had in days. This was it. They were going to get Neal back.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“Boss,” Diana called as soon as he walked through the bullpen doors, “the judge won’t sign the warrant, says it’s too circumstantial.”

“What?” Peter demanded as he strode towards her desk, his earlier panic returning. “Who’s the judge?” 

“Judge Hickman,” she said with just a hint of a smile on her lips. 

“The judge that -,” 

“Yep,” she confirmed. 

Peter shook his head wryly but quickly refocused. 

“Does he still have those chambers that aren’t attached to the court building?” 

Diana nodded. “If it were any other day I’d ask you to pick up a snack from the bakery for me, their bakery is surprisingly good.” 

Peter nodded is agreement, gathering the fresh warrant request paperwork Diana had already filled out and printed for him. 

“Yeah, it’s been over a year and those two are still keeping it open. Remind me to figure out what long con they’re planning with it after we get Neal back.” 

“Will do,” she called to his back as he disappeared out the doors. 

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“I’m sorry, Burke, but you have to see where I’m coming from,” Judge Hickman implored. “A spring and a slight glimpse of _part_ of a tattoo and you want an armed entrance warrant?” 

Peter took a deep breath. He knew it sounded unreasonable, but he also knew he was right. 

"Your Honor, how many times have I requested warrants from you?" Peter asked seriously.

"Burke," the judge sighed, "I didn’t keep track after the first thousand."

Peter nodded. “And how many times have I been completely off base?”

The judge sighed again.  


“Never,” he conceded grudgingly. 

“Never,” Peter repeated. “I don’t make requests until I’m sure and I’m telling you, this is it. Neal dropped this. I know it’s from the same pen, I would know it anywhere. I took this thing apart hundreds of times, I’m telling you, it’s the same spring. He was there. Besides that, the inspection codes for the warehouse have expired, if you have to, get me a warrant for that and I’ll check for Neal while I’m there."

The judge stared at him, and Peter held his gaze unflinchingly.

The judge was the first to look away, flicking his eyes down to the warrant request in front of him, then back up to Peter's resolute expression.

"Fine," he sighed, scrawling his name across the bottom line, "but if you're wrong about this, you have to do the inspection while you're there."

"Deal," Peter agreed instantly, swaying slightly in his relief.

The judge shook his head with a rueful smile, holding the warrant out to Peter, who took it immediately.

"You're a pain in my ass, Burke," he said lightly, waving Peter out of his office. "I've grown kind of fond of that consultant of yours, though. Go bring him home."

"I will," Peter promised, flashing the judge one more grateful smile before he strode out of the room.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“I know I have been asking unreasonable hours,” Peter started, studying the exhausted faces of his team, “and it's not fair, but is anyone willing to work tonight to be part of the raid?"

"I'm in," Diana said immediately, and Peter felt a wave of gratitude crash over him at her instant support.

"Hey, my man Caffrey is in trouble," Jones said beside her, "I'm there, Peter."

"I'm in," Joe said firmly.

"Me too," Zoe added with a resolute nod.

"Peter," Chi-chi said, waiting until Peter looked her way to continue. "I think I speak for all of us when I say Neal is one of us, we'll be here for as long as it takes to get him back."

The agents around her nodded firmly, and Peter shut his eyes as relief coursed through him.

"Thank you," he whispered, opening his eyes again to look each of them in the eye.

"Caffrey is one of us," Jamal said seriously, "and we don't leave anyone behind."

Peter twitched a grin as he nodded his agreement, never more thankful for his people than he was in this moment.

"Ok," Peter said, pulling himself back to the task at hand. "We know they’re moving into arms dealing, so we can expect an armed response to our tactical teams. Everyone suit up. Jones, Diana, and I are going to put together our entrance strategy. We move out in twenty minutes, and we're going to get our consultant back."

"Damn straight," Zoe said with a grin. "It's his turn to get donuts next, he's not getting out of it that easily."

The agents around her laughed, breaking some of the tension that had fallen over the group. 

“Can’t have him skipping out on that,” Peter agreed with a smile, the tension constricting his chest loosening for the first time in days. 

“Exactly,” Diana agreed, heading towards the conference room. “Come on, Peter, Jones, let’s go make a plan to get the pain in our ass back.” 

Peter smiled as Jones laughed beside him, jogging up the stairs after Diana. 

“Yeah. Let’s do that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for the kudos and comments, I appreciate all of them SO much!


	7. Saving the Con

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone, sorry for the long wait! Life got crazy, but here’s chapter seven, I hope you like it!

Diana nodded and Jamal swung the battering ram forward, sending the door crashing inwards as it fell off its hinges.

Peter moved in, leading the others into the room as soon as the door gave way.

"FBI!" Peter announced as his agents fanned out around the room, "hands in the air!"

They had interrupted something, payday by the looks of it. One man was holding a stack of money, carefully counting bills off the stack and handing them to each of the two dozen men standing around the room.

"What?" the man distributing the money demanded, and Peter instantly recognized his voice.

Beside him, Diana bristled and Peter knew she had recognized Claw's voice as well.

“You’re under arrest for illegal arms dealing and the kidnapping of Neal Caffrey,” Peter informed them. “Where is he?”

Claw clenched his jaw as he considered the situation.

“So, which one of you is Peter?” he asked instead of answering the question.

“I am,” Peter said, his tone clipped, and Claw nodded thoughtfully, studying him.

“Hmm,” he hummed in slight surprise, “seems he was right. He told us you were coming. You’re too late though," he said, a malicious smile spreading across his face, "have fun saying goodbye to your little pet."

Peter stared at him in horror for a second before he broke himself out of his shock and turned to his agents.

“Team one get them out of here,” he ordered, “teams two and three, sweep the building, _now_!”

He led his team through the doors in the back of the room, trusting Diana’s team to be able to handle booking them all.  
  


“Team three entering the rear of the building,” Jones’ voice crackled through the radio. “On planned route, beginning sweep now.”

“Understood,” Peter said into the radio, gesturing his team members toward various rooms in the long hallway. “Team two has begun our sweep in the planned location, over.”

Around him, agents disappeared into rooms, alert and ready, calling ‘Clear!’ as they confirmed each room empty.

Peter made his way past them, on down the hall to the room he had designated himself to check. In the heart of the building, it was the most likely place to keep Neal, and Peter moved closer with every step.

Finally, he made it down the hall and to the assigned room, throwing the door open and sweeping the area.

His breath caught in his throat. None of Claw's men were in the room, but huddled in the corner, chained to the floor, was a very familiar form.

“Neal!” Peter called, running across the room and dropping to his knees at Neal’s side.

“Found him!” Peter called into his radio, reaching out to lay a gentle hand on Neal’s face. “He’s running one hell of a fever, call an ambulance, tell them I need them here yesterday!”

“On it!” Diana’s voice responded through the radio.

“Relay the ETA as soon as you know it,” Peter instructed, releasing the button on his radio and bending closer to Neal.

“Neal?” Peter called softly, one hand still on his cheek, and Neal started to stir.

“Peter?” he rasped when his eyes cracked open, the raw hope in his tone painful.

“Yeah,” Peter nodded, smiling wetly down at him, “it’s me, we found you, Neal.”

He brought his other hand to Neal’s shoulder, and could feel the heat radiating off him, even through his shirt.  
  


“Buddy, you’re on fire,” Peter said, trying to keep his spiking worry out of his voice. “Your fever is through the roof here, did they give you something?”

Neal looked up at him with wet, teary eyes and shook his head, raising his wrists toward Peter.

Peter gently took the offered wrists, and Neal let his arms go limp, trusting his handler to support their weight.

Peter looked down at Neal’s arms and froze, horror crashing over him as he took in the state of Neal’s wrists.

He was wearing handcuffs, but his captors had obviously become aware of his unique skill set, because he was wearing two sets of handcuffs, a zip tie poked through the keyholes of each set, tying them to each other and making them impossible to pick until the zip tie was removed.

The handcuffs had been tightened so much they broke the skin, and Neal’s wrists wept with infection, cloudy yellow liquid oozing out of the wounds.

With a detached terror, Peter made himself look down at Neal’s hands. The fingers weren’t blackened or the blue of poor circulation, but if they didn’t get Neal to a hospital soon, he might lose them anyway.

“Peter,” Neal said again, sounding relieved. “I -”

He cut himself off with a cough, which turned into a moan as he wrapped his arms around himself and tried to curl into a ball, panting for breath.

Peter winced in sympathy, pulling Neal’s shirt up to reveal mottled purples and greens covering his chest and stomach.

“Broken ribs,” Peter said, more to himself than to Neal. “Let’s pull you up, Neal, then you’ll be able to breathe better, ok?”

“Ok,” Neal tried to push out, the result barely more than a whisper.

Peter slid a careful arm under Neal’s shoulder, slowly pulling the hurt man up to lean against his shoulder.

The change in Neal’s situation seemed to register just as he settled against Peter’s shoulder, and he burst into relieved tears, burying his face in Peter’s chest.

Peter’s arms instantly came up to hug him, mindful of the broken ribs, holding him tight and running a reassuring hand down his back.

Distantly, Peter noted the calls of ‘Clear!’ coming through the radio, his team working hard to clear the building so paramedics could come on the scene.

Neal’s breathing had improved when Peter sat him up, taking the pressure off the broken ribs, but was sounding more and more pained and difficult as Neal kept crying.

“Shhh,” Peter soothed, rocking them slightly, and Neal pushed himself even closer.

“You came,” Neal choked out weakly, a note of awe in his voice.

“Of course I came,” Peter said, warm and reassuring. “I’ll always come.”

Neal drew in a gasping breath through his sobs, trying to respond.

“I wasn’t trying to run, Peter, I promise! Please don’t leave me here, Peter, please!”

“No, Neal, buddy, I know you weren’t running, you were undercover, remember? It’s ok, Neal, it’s ok. I’ll always come for you,” Peter promised, petting a hand through Neal’s hair and pulling him closer. “We’re not going to leave you, we came to take you home.”

“Peter,” Neal gulped. “Peter, they said -, they -, please don’t let them keep me!”

“Never, Neal,” Peter said, firm and sure. “I’ll always come for you, you know that.”

“Always?” Neal asked, like he needed to hear the reassurance again.

“Always,” Peter promised.

“You’re the only one,” Neal cried, gripping his handler’s shirt tighter, “you’re the only one who’s ever come, the only one who’s ever believed in me.”

Peter winced, feeling that hit like a physical blow.

“I will always come for you, Neal,” he murmured again in a soft voice, only for Neal’s ears as he heard his team approaching the doorway. “And I do believe in you, and others will too, because you’re good, Neal.”

“Good?” Neal asked, a hint of disbelieving wonder in his voice.

“Good,” Peter confirmed as Jones led the other agents into the room.

“Jones,” Peter called as soon as the man came through the doorway. “Relay to Diana to tell the EMT’s his wrists are infected, his fever is boiling, and he’s got broken ribs, get them here now!”

Jones nodded, stepping back into the hallway and talking urgently into his radio.

“Jamal!” Peter directed, “go flag them down.”

“On it,” Jamal called, jogging out the door.

“Chi-chi, find me something to cut these zip ties and get me a handcuff key, Jake, get blankets out of the cars!”

They both nodded, hurrying out of the room.

“We’re taking you home,” Peter promised Neal, who had curled even further into Peter when he heard the other voices. “That’s just White Collar, just your team, we’re here to bring you home.”

Neal relaxed marginally at the explanation, continuing to cry into Peter’s chest, but losing the terrified edge.

“Peter,” Jones said as he came back in, “EMTs just pulled in, should be in here in less than five minutes.”

Peter nodded, but didn’t look up, softly shushing Neal as he continued to rub his back, his consultant calming more with each pass of his hand.

“Here!” Chi-chi called, holding up a pair of thick scissors as soon as she rounded the corner.

“I’m back, too,” Jake announced, following her into the room.

He came forward and gently spread the blanket over Neal’s shoulders, tucking the corners in so it wouldn’t be dislodged as they freed him from the handcuffs.

Chi-chi knelt in front of them as soon as Jake stepped back, ready to cut the zip ties.  
  


Peter reached into the cocoon of blanket and gently brought Neal’s wrists out.

Neal whimpered, but calmed down as Peter started talking to him again.

“It’s ok, Neal, it’s just me,” Peter said soothingly, using one hand to hold both of Neal’s wrists so Chi-chi could cut the zip ties.

There was a sharp snap as they were cut, and Neal flinched, but didn’t otherwise try to reclaim his wrists, trusting Peter to help him, even when his fever was too high for him to truly understand what was happening.

“There we go,” Peter narrated, noticing that Neal was calmer when he could hear his voice. “Good, zip ties are off. And look at that, Mabena is prepared, here’s the key. First set, here we go, perfect, they’re open. Second set, good, they’re open too.”

Chi-chi stowed the handcuff key back in her pocket, but looked at both pairs of handcuffs apprehensively.

The handcuffs had broken the skin days ago, and the infection had formed around them, removing them was going to be messy and painful.

“Leave them for now,” Peter instructed in a low murmur. “The paramedics are almost here, they’ll know what we should do about them.”

Chi-chi nodded, looking relieved she wasn’t going to have to try to remove the embedded cuffs.

Down the hall, Peter heard the wheels of a gurney being rushed toward them. The paramedics. Excellent.

“There he is,” Diana pointed out, standing back by the doorway as the paramedics pushed past her, making a beeline for Peter and Neal.

Chi-chi hurriedly stood, moving out of their way as they brought the gurney over, lowering it to the floor once they crossed the room.

“He’s got extremely infected wrists,” Peter said, listing off Neal’s injuries as efficiently as he could, “several broken ribs, and he’s running an extremely high fever. He’s been missing, so expect dehydration and malnutrition as well. I’ve seen no evidence of a head wound, but no definitive proof to think he doesn’t have one, and he has no food or medical allergies.”

“Ok,” the woman who led the team of three into the room said decisively. “We need to take care of these handcuffs first. We’ll pull the metal out, get him on the gurney, and get stats en route, agreed?”

The two men with her nodded seriously, one of them crouching in front of Peter to inspect Neal’s wrists.

“These are bad,” he announced. “Woodard, I’m going to need gauze.”

The other man nodded, turning to dig through the duffel bag he carried.

"Liebeck,” he called to the other paramedic, “I’ll need a fresh set of gloves when I’m done, there’s pus everywhere.”

The woman nodded, pulling the side pocket open of the duffel bag the other man was searching through.

“Ok,” the paramedic said to Peter, his tone suddenly calm and reassuring. “My name is Chuck Paulda, what should I call you two?”

Peter nodded an acknowledgment, unwilling to let go of Neal to offer any other kind of greeting.

“I’m Peter, this is Neal. Neal’s been kidnapped for four days, we just found him.”

Chuck’s expression became even more serious, nodding that he understood.

“Ok, Peter, we’re going to bring Neal’s arms out of the blanket, just like that, good. Then, in just a second, I’m going to pull the metal straight down. It’s not going to be pleasant, so be ready in case he jerks around.”

Peter swallowed hard, nodding as he resituated his grip on Neal.

Neal had calmed significantly. His crying had stopped and he lay limply against Peter, allowing his arms to be moved without a fuss.

“On the count of three,” Chuck said, carefully gripping the handcuffs in each wrist, arranging his grip so he could pull all four pieces down at the same time. “One.... two... three!”

He pulled them out, and they disconnected with a sickening sound.

The effect was instantaneous. Neal ripped his arms out of Chuck’s grip, curling into Peter and ducking his head under his blanket, hiding.

“No more!” Neal sobbed. “Peter! No! Peter! Come back!”

“I’m here, Neal,” Peter reassured, rubbing his back again and tightening the hug. “I’m here, shh, I’m here. No more, it’s ok, Neal, I’m here.”

Neal’s frantic struggle stopped, but Peter could still hear the pained tears that were wetting his shoulder.

Peter ran a hand through Neal's hair, calming him a little more, and looked back to the paramedic, non-verbally asking what he needed to do next.

“Now we need to wrap this gauze around his wrists,” Chuck explained. “Can you pull one of his arms out here for me?”

Peter looked down at his consultant, spotting his hands clenched to his chest under the blanket.

“Neal,” he called softly. “I’m going to move one of your arms so we can wrap it up. It’s just me, it’s ok.”

Neal allowed the arm to be pulled out with an unhappy grunt, but didn’t resist as Peter pulled his arm back into the light.

Chuck made quick work of wrapping it up, soon gesturing for the other one, which Neal allowed with the same ill grace.

“Wrists, wrapped and ready,” Chuck reported, standing up and moving to the other side of the gurney as he changed his gloves.

“Good work,” Liebeck said. “You guys ready for the gurney transfer?”

They nodded, pushing the gurney as close to Neal as possible and taking their places around it.

“Count of three,” Liebeck said, and the other two nodded, setting their hands where they needed to in anticipation of the transfer. “One... two... three!”

In one smooth move they transferred Neal from Peter’s arms to the gurney.

Neal flung an arm out as soon as he lost contact with his handler, and Peter immediately took his reaching hand.

The paramedics raised the gurney, and Peter stood with it, ready to follow Neal to the ambulance.

“I’m sorry, Peter," Chuck said, shaking his head, "there won’t be enough room for you in the ambulance, you’ll have to follow to the hospital.”

Peter nodded, swallowing down his protest, and reminded himself they had a job to do as he tried to push down the wave of panic that had sprung up at the thought of letting Neal out of his sight.

Chuck waved him away and Peter reluctantly released Neal’s hand as he stepped back.

Neal’s fingers followed him, reaching off the gurney for Peter.

“No!” Neal sobbed, straining toward his handler, struggling frantically as the paramedics began to roll him towards the door.

“Peter!” he screamed, raw and desperate, reaching toward him with wide, panicked eyes.

“It’s ok, Neal!” Peter called helplessly, “I’m right here!”

His reassurances did nothing to calm Neal’s struggles or the tears once again streaming down his face.

“No!” Neal sobbed, sounding devastated, “Peter! Don’t let them take me! Please, I want Peter, he said I could come home! Peter!”

“You are coming home, buddy,” Peter tried to reassure him over the paramedic’s shoulder. “These are EMTs, you’re coming home.”

“No! Peter!” Neal sobbed, reaching for Peter like a distraught toddler.

Unable to stand it anymore, Peter moved forward, taking Neal’s hand in one of his own, using his other to card his fingers through Neal’s hair.

Neal calmed instantly, pushing into the physical contact and closing his eyes in relief.

“You know, sir,” Chuck said, watching the pair in amazement, “somehow I think we’ll be able to squeeze you in.”

Peter nodded in relief, walking with the gurney as the paramedics started pushing it again.

“Hear that, Neal?” Peter asked, Neal relaxing more with every word Peter spoke, “I’m coming with you. I’m gonna be there, it’s going to be ok.”

They made it outside the building, the ambulance doors already open wide.

Peter clambered into the back, making sure not to lose Neal’s hand as he pulled himself up, and the gurney followed soon after.

“Diana, Jones,” Peter called out the back, barely remembering in time, “you two coordinate.”

They both nodded, and the ambulance doors closed with a thud, the vehicle racing out to the street barely a second later.

They had found him. Finally, after days of searching, they had found him.

Peter looked down at his consultant and prayed they weren’t too late.


	8. Hiding and Seeking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! I’d just like to say that I am not a doctor, a nurse, or any kind of healthcare professional, so I apologize if the medical care in this chapter is incorrect or lacking. I hope you like the chapter, I’d love to hear what you think!

The double doors opened as a harried looking nurse strode into the waiting room.

“Are there any people here for Neal Caffrey?” he asked the room brusquely.

Peter stood up immediately, closely followed by the Diana and Jones.

“We are,” he called, catching the nurse’s attention.

“Good,” the man said, walking over to them. “Are any of you Peter?”

“Uh, yeah, I am,” Peter answered, a little stunned.

“Oh, thank god,” the nurse muttered under his breath.

“I’m going to need you to come back with me,” he continued at a normal volume.

Peter exchanged a quick glance with Diana and Jones before hurrying after the man.

“We’ll fill Elizabeth in when she gets here,” Diana called after him.

“And inform the team,” Jones added.

Peter flashed them a grateful smile over his shoulder as he walked through the swinging double doors.

Peter followed the stressed nurse through several twisting hallways before he spoke.

“So, is he ok?” Peter asked.

The nurse threw a look over his shoulder, and Peter got the distinct impression he was being sized up. The nurse apparently felt Peter could handle the answer because he said, “Well, yes and no.”

The man stepped into an elevator, waiting for Peter to follow him, and pushed the button for the third floor.

“He stands an excellent chance of recovery, but his fever is so high he doesn’t understand what’s happening. He struggled and cried for the first bit, but we were doing ok holding him down until the doctor said something about keeping him in the ICU for a few days.”

Peter distantly noticed the elevator opening and he followed the nurse out automatically, hanging on to every word of his answer.

“I don’t know,” the nurse shrugged. “He just... he just exploded, frantically flailing to get away. He wiggled out of our grasp and then went sprinting out of the room, locked himself in one of our medicine rooms. He’s not trying to take anything, he’s just... hiding. He keeps yelling through the door that Peter said we didn’t get to take him and Peter was coming to kick all of our asses and save him.”

The nurse shrugged, signing Peter into a visitor log without bothering to ask his last name before he led them onward down the hall.

“Oh.” Peter said softly, trying to shove down the pain that was clawing its way up his chest.

The nurse cast him a sidelong look.

“You know what the problem is?”

Peter nodded. “He... Neal... He -, we just rescued him, he’s my CI, I’m a federal agent. Neal was taken four days ago and we just found him.”

The nurse stopped short, staring at Peter.

“Oh,” he said, finally walking again. “Yeah, that’ll do it. I’m sorry, that wasn’t in the file and paramedics didn’t pass that on to us. We were wondering how he got those cuts on his wrist.”

Peter winced as he nodded.

“Yeah, handcuffs and zip ties, the bastards were thorough. He struggled pretty hard, cut his wrists all to hell.”

“Oh,” the nurse repeated softly.

He turned the corner and led them toward a group of annoyed nurses gathered around a closed door.

“I have Peter,” he called to them, his body language suddenly extremely sympathetic.

“Finally,” a nurse in purple scrubs bit out. “He’s still freakin in there, and patients are starting to be late on their medicines. Can you fix it?” she asked Peter.

He nodded and moved past the group, peripherally aware of the nurse who brought him pulling the others aside to whisper something to them. Peter tuned them out, focusing on the panicked breaths he could hear through the door.

“Neal?” He called, keeping his voice reassuring and calm. “Neal, are you in there buddy?”

“Peter?” Neal asked desperately.

Peter winced at how terrified he sounded.

“Yeah, Neal, yeah, it’s me.”

“You came for me?” Neal asked in a small, vulnerable voice that Peter was surprised made it through the thick door.

“Yeah, buddy,” he said firmly. “I’ll always come for you, you know that. No one left behind, we’ll always come for you.”

“There were... people,” Neal sounded confused. “They, they were all yelling and asking questions. They held me down, Peter. You said you’d take me home, can I please go home? I’ll be good, I promise. Please don’t leave me here, Peter!”

Peter closed his eyes and rested his forehead against the door.

“I’m sorry you had to be alone, Neal, but I’m here now. I’ll protect you, I won’t let anyone get you.”

“Promise?” Neal asked in a trusting whisper.

Peter glanced to the huddle of nurses who now all appeared extremely sympathetic.

“I can stay with him, _right_?” He asked in a tone that implied the topic was not up for discussion.

The nurses nodded their assent and he turned back to the door.

“I promise, Neal,” he said firmly, putting as much warmth and conviction into his voice as he could. “I’ll be with you, I’ll protect you.”

He watched the door handle as the lock slowly turned and the door hesitantly swung inwards just enough for Neal’s fever bright eyes to peer out at the hallway.

Peter smiled at him, bringing his arms up in a gesture of surrender and harmlessness.

Within a second, Neal shot out of the room and burrowed himself into what he had taken as an invitation for a hug.

After a stunned moment of trying to figure out what had happened, Peter hugged him back, pulling him in protectively as he swiveled to face the nurses.

“What do we need to do?” he asked quietly.

“We should go back to an exam room,” a nurse in green scrubs said, gesturing towards a room down the hall.

Neal tensed at the sound of other voices and pushed himself impossibly closer to Peter.

Peter rubbed a hand down his back and felt him lose some of his terrified tenseness.

“It’ll be ok, Neal,” he said quietly, “I’m not leaving you.”

Peter looked at the door, then back to the group of nurses.

“Is the doctor in there?” Peter asked the man in green who had answered him before.

He shook his head, looking apologetic.

“No, she’s making her rounds now, she said to page her as soon as we got him back to the room and settled.”

“It won’t take long to get her back,” the woman in purple added reassuringly seeing Peter’s displeased expression.

Peter nodded and turned his attention back to Neal.

“Ok Neal, we’re gonna go down the hall, ok?”

Neal nodded but refused to let go of the hug. After some light tugging, Peter chuckled and started walking, laughing outright when Neal merely shuffled backwards without breaking contact.

“Always so dramatic,” Peter teased fondly, glad the door was only a few paces away.

“On the bed,” another nurse murmured, waving her hand towards the bed tucked against the far wall.

Peter nodded and shuffled Neal toward it.

Using a few modified Quantico escape moves, he pried Neal off and settled him on the bed, letting him capture Peter’s hand and clutch it like a security blanket.

Neal allowed the substitution, but tensed, poised to run, when the nurse who pointed them to the bed approached with a tray of equipment.

Peter blinked, disappointed with himself. These were Neal’s nurses, he should have been paying attention to their names.

The woman trying to approach them had a name tag. Good. Peter squinted at it. Caroline. He could remember that. He turned his attention back to Neal.

“Neal,” he said, resting a light hand on his consultant’s chest in case the man tried to make a run for it. “Listen to me, can you do that?”

Neal turned to look at him with wide, earnest eyes and nodded.

“Good,” Peter smiled, “thanks buddy. This is Caroline. These are your nurses, Neal, they’re here to make you feel better.”

“Not bad guys?” Neal asked, staring up at Peter like a trusting child.

“Not bad guys,” Peter confirmed, squeezing his hand.

“Oh,” Neal said, mulling that over.

Peter subtly waved the nurse over so she could start quietly laying out what she needed.

“Neal, have I ever lied to you?” Peter asked

Neal scrunched up his nose as he thought about the question. Peter nodded over his head and the nurse started the IV line while her patient was distracted.

“Well,” Neal pondered, “there was that time you told me deviled ham is good.”

“Deviled ham is good!” Peter shot back indignantly, distracted from the warm reassuring tone he’d been trying to keep up.

“Hmm,” Neal hummed noncommittally with a smile. “I guess you don’t lie, you just have no taste buds.”

“Ok, says the man that eats raw fish eggs,” Peter argued.

“Hmm,” Neal hummed again, swaying slightly as he looked at his handler.

“Caviar is a delicacy, Peter,” Neal informed him seriously, and Peter took a moment to marvel at Neal’s ability to sound like a debonair gentleman even when delirious with fever.

“Caviar is disgusting,” Peter insisted.

“How did you marry an event planner?” Neal asked, sounding honestly bewildered.

Peter let some of the tension flow out of his shoulders as they found their rhythm in their banter.

“I’m smart and sexy, that’s how,” he said, his normal grin finally growing on his face.

Neal’s brow furrowed in exhausted disagreement as the nurse finished hooking up the machines and IV line with a smile at their teasing and moved on to cleaning one of Neal’s wrists.

“Sorry Peter, but that’s wrong,” he said bluntly, in a tone of one confused as to why they had to explain the obvious.

“Well,” he amended, paying no attention to Peter’s indignant spluttering in the background, “you are really smart. Like really, really, really smart. I think you’re the smartest person I’ve ever met.”

“Thank you,” Peter accepted, partially mollified.

“But you’re not sexy,” Neal reiterated, making sure his original point didn’t get lost in the compliment.

“El thinks I am,” Peter said smugly.

“Oh, right,” Neal muttered as he remembered something. “I forgot, Elizabeth likes mathletes.”

“I wasn’t a mathlete!” Peter shot back indignantly. “I was a math major and an athlete!”

Neal nodded his agreement.

“A mathlete,” he repeated.

“No,” Peter insisted, ignoring the nurses around the room quietly laughing at him. “No, I was a professional baseball player before the FBI.”

Neal nodded again. “A professional mathlete,” he agreed solemnly. “Does that make you a special kind of elite nerd?”

“Neal, of the two of us, you are the nerd, not me.”

“You own a sextant,” Neal said, his tone clearly implying he considered himself the winner of the argument on that response alone.

Peter rolled his eyes. “You live in a defunct speakeasy.”

“Yeah, that‘s _cool,_ Peter,” Neal pointed out, “something you would know if you weren’t the king nerd.”

Peter rolled his eyes and sat back emphatically to make a point of his lack of agreement, accidentally pulling his hand out of Neal’s relaxing grip in the process.

Neal shot forward, almost falling out of the bed in his hurry to reclaim Peter’s hand, clutching it tightly with both of his own.

“I’m sorry,” he pleaded in wide eyed desperation. “I’m sorry, please don’t leave.”

Peter leaned forward again, using his other hand to cover the backs of Neal’s frantically squeezing fingers.

“Neal, buddy, deep breath. Breathe, you can do it. Don’t be sorry, I’m not leaving. I made a promise, remember?”

Neal nodded, sitting back and letting Caroline reclaim the wrist she had been working on, the rest of the nurses filtering out once they had set up the room.

“And I keep my promises to you, right?” Peter prodded, wondering if Neal was going to snark at him for talking to him like he was four.

“Yeah,” Neal breathed, slumping back onto the bed in relief. “Yeah, you do.”

“Ok, good, I’m glad your hard head can at least remember that one. I’m not going to leave you here alone just because you were losing an argument.”

Neal quirked a small grin, letting his eyes fall shut.

“Wasn’t losing,” he mumbled, his exhaustion catching up to him once that the crisis had been averted.

“Sure you weren’t, buddy,” Peter chuckled, squeezing his hand. 

Peter smiled fondly as Neal fell asleep, still clutching Peter’s hand. 

“You’re good with him,” Caroline observed. 

“Oh,” Peter blushed, his sleepless brain refusing to provide a response. 

Caroline chuckled quietly. “How long have you known him?” she asked as she finished wrapping his other wrist. 

“He‘s been a pain in my ass for almost ten years, but he’s only been my CI for a little over two years now.” 

She nodded her understanding as she cleaned up the tools she had used and pulled Neal’s chart off the wall to make a note on it. 

“CI is Consulting Investigator?” she asked, still writing. 

“Yeah,” Peter said, “I’m with White Collar, and Neal is the best of the best.”

She smiled at the two of them. “Sounds like a good man to have on your team then.” 

Peter nodded, but before he could answer, the door swung open, admitting a dark haired woman in a white coat. Must be the doctor, then. 

“Hello,” she said softly, noting her patient was asleep on the bed. “My name is Dr. Hathale.” 

“Yahana,” Caroline called quietly, catching the doctor’s attention. “I don’t have the wrapping for his ribs since this wasn’t his original room. I’ve wrapped and sterilized his wrists, he’s been started on an IV drip, antibiotics, and pain meds, and I’ve updated his chart. Do you need me to do anything else before I go get the things for his ribs?” 

Dr. Hathale smiled and shook her head. “On top of things, as always, Caroline. No, just grab the wrappings and a blanket for the bed since the room wasn’t actually intended for use yet.” 

“Got it,” Caroline chirped, disappearing out the door and down the hall. 

“So, I see you and our nurses got him back into a bed. Are you the infamous Peter we’ve all been hearing about?” 

Peter huffed a laugh. “Yes, ma’am, that’s me.” 

She gave a friendly nod as she read over Neal’s chart. 

“One of the nurses stopped me in the hallway and caught me up on his situation. I’m sorry. I’ll personally follow up on why that information wasn’t passed onto us.” 

“Good,” Peter said firmly. “Thank you.”

She put the chart back on the hook and moved toward the bed, pulling her stethoscope out and warming it on her palm before she slid it under Neal’s hospital gown to listen to his breathing. 

“His heart sounds good, but there’s a slight crackle in his left lung I want to keep an eye on. The antibiotics should take care of it, but we’ll check on it whenever we come in just to make sure.” 

She pulled out a thermometer and set it lightly against Neal’s forehead, waiting until it beeped to confirm the reading. 

Her mouth twisted in displeasure at what she read. 

“One hundred and four, if it doesn’t come down with the antibiotics we may need to put him on a cooled IV drip.” 

Peter cast a worried look at his sleeping consultant. 

Caroline saved him from coming up with a response by slipping back into the room with several packages of wide bandaging. 

“I’m sorry, sir,” Dr. Hathale said, looking at Peter. “We’re going to have to ask you to move back so we can sit him up and wrap his ribs. We’ll wrap them for a few hours, to help his pain and his breathing, but we’ll have to unwrap them periodically to make sure he doesn’t get pneumonia.” 

Beside her, Caroline carefully laid out the thick wrapping they would use on a sterile tray.

Peter nodded reluctantly and gently set Neal’s hand down on the bed before standing up and stepping back by the wall to give them room to work. 

As soon as Peter released his hand, Neal started shifting around, whimpering softly as he tried to make his way back to consciousness. 

Peter watched him anxiously, shoving his hands in his pockets in an attempt to stop them from reaching out and taking Neal’s hand again. 

“Peter,” Neal pleaded, still asleep, but barely. “No, Peter! Peter, please!” 

“I’m right here, buddy,” Peter said, hoping he could anchor his consultant with just his voice. 

Neal’s head turned toward him, but the pleas didn’t stop. 

“Please, Peter! No, Peter promised! He _promised_!” Neal sounded heartbroken and desperate, and after glancing at the other two in the room, Peter risked stepping forward and reaching out to set an arm on his shoulder while they set up what they needed. 

“Hey, it’s ok, Neal. I’m here,” Peter said.

Neal immediately stopped panicking and sunk into the bed with a relieved sigh. 

Peter took a deep breath, glad he had been able to allay Neal’s fears, and hoped Neal could soak up the reassurance before Peter had to step back again. 

The two women were efficient and they were ready to start within a few seconds, so Peter reluctantly stepped back again. 

The instant Peter’s hand left his shoulder, Neal’s brow furrowed and his heart rate displayed on the machine beside him spiked. 

Peter sent the other two a sheepish look and stepped forward again to rest his hand on Neal’s own. 

Immediately, Neal settled, and his heart rate returned to the even cadence it had been before. 

Dr. Hathale shook her head wryly. 

“Well, alright then,” she said. “We’ll have to find a way to work around you.” 

Caroline chuckled quietly as she set the wrappings she had prepared back on the tray so she could consider the situation. 

“Well, we’ll need to be on both sides to wrap them. What if Mr. Peter here sat on the bed behind our patient, where he would be able to hold him out slightly and we could wrap?” 

Dr. Hathale nodded along with the proposed plan, turning to Peter. 

“That could work, would you be ok with that?” 

Peter shrugged, vaguely uncomfortable. 

“If that’s what it takes.” 

“Excellent,” Dr. Hathale said. 

Before any of them could continue, the door swung quietly open, revealing the nurse that had retrieved Peter from the waiting room. 

“Thanks for covering, Caroline,” he said in an undertone, mindful of Neal who was sleeping peacefully. 

“No problem,” she whispered, waving him over. 

“We’re about to wrap his ribs, but we can’t let him be separated from Peter, here,” she explained quietly.

He looked confused at the last condition, but dutifully nodded. 

“We’ll incline the bed, then you’ll hold the patient up far enough that Mr. Peter can slip behind him while I double check the charts are up to date.” 

He nodded and moved to the controls on the side of the bed, carefully raising Neal into a near sitting position. 

“Ok,” Matt said, “I’m going to pull him straight forward, you slip behind him, a leg on each side.” 

Peter nodded and moved to the head of the bed. 

“Take your shoes and jacket off,” Caroline added from where she was looking over the charts. 

Peter slipped his shoes off and shucked his jacket on the nearby chair, looking at Matt again when he was ready. 

Matt very carefully pulled Neal up, unintentionally dislodging Peter’s hand as he shifted to get around him. 

“No,” Neal whimpered, twisting in Matt’s grip, “Peter!” 

Peter worked fast, nimbly slipping behind his consultant and putting his hands on Neal’s shoulders to guide him back down. 

“Hey, Neal,” Peter said as they reclined Neal against his chest, “I’m still here.” 

Neal twisted slightly so he could curl his right side against Peter’s chest, his head resting over Peter’s heart, and relaxed again, slumping back into a boneless unconsciousness. 

“Oh,” Matt said, staring at his patient. “I guess that’s why there was the no separation rule.” 

“Yep,” Dr. Hathale confirmed, handing him the bandages to hold while she got into place on the other side. 

“Yahana, Matt,” Caroline said, putting the chart back on the hook. “I’m done with this, do you need anything before I check room three oh seven?”

“We got this,” Matt said confidently, and she nodded and ducked out the door. 

Peter looked down at Neal and sighed, ready for more directions as the team of two finished taking their places on either side of him and Neal. It was going to be a long night.


	9. Clicking Into Place

“Neal Caffrey?” the same nurse from earlier asked. He looked like he was in a better mood this time though, so hopefully that meant good news for Neal.

“We are,” Diana called, standing up with El and Jones and making their way toward him.

“Perfect,” the nurse said, “he can have visitors now, if you want to follow me up to his room.”

“You’re in a better mood,” Jones noted lightly, following him through the double doors and down the hallway. “Does that mean he’s going to be fine?”

The nurse grinned sheepishly at them as he pressed the button for the elevator.

“Yeah,” he said, stepping in when the doors opened and hitting floor three, “he’ll make a full recovery. Sorry about earlier, we had no idea he had been kidnapped, the paramedics didn’t pass that along to us.”

Diana frowned and he gave her a helpless shrug.

“Maybe they thought it would be obvious?” he suggested, not sounding overly convinced.

  
Diana pursed her lips.

“We’re working on getting to the bottom of this,” he assured, “we’ll make sure whatever the communication problem was is fixed immediately.”

The elevator doors opened and he led them into another brightly lit hallway.

“His fever spiked as the doctor was talking about keeping him in the ICU and he panicked, shot off the bed and managed to slip past all us and bolt. He locked himself in our medicine room and informed us that Peter was going to kick our ass if we tried to take him.”

Diana huffed a laugh, following him out of the elevator. “In all fairness, Peter would.”

The nurse chuckled, leading them through another set of double doors.

“Yeah, we picked up on that,” he agreed.

Jones laughed. “He been giving you trouble?”

“No more than we can handle,” the nurse assured, leading them past a visitor desk.

“Can you three sign here?”

He waited for them to sign and led them down yet another hallway, this one with a room at the end.

The light was off, so they quietly made their way into the room.

El walked through the doorway and stopped short, laughing fondly as she took in the image of her husband asleep on the hospital bed, head resting on the head of his CI, who was wrapped around him like an octopus, hugging one of Peter’s hands tightly to his chest.

Diana laughed, “I told the boss he needed a nap.”

The nurse chuckled as well. “Yeah, he fell asleep about ten minutes ago, right after the doctor left. We figured, given the circumstances before our patient came in, Agent.... Peter, sorry I only know his first name, needed his rest.”

Jones snorted. “Agent Peter works fine.”

“Thank you for letting him sleep,” El said sincerely. “He’s only slept three hours in the past four days.”

“Not a problem, ma’am,” the nurse smiled at her. “I’m Matt by the way. I’ll be Neal’s nurse for tonight.”

“Thank you, Matt,” El smiled, pulling her phone out to snap several pictures of the sleeping pair.

“Does Neal really live in a defunct speakeasy?” Matt asked curiously.

Jones snorted. “Yes, he does. How’d that come up?”

“Well,” Matt said with a grin as he pulled Neal’s chart off the wall to make a note, “they had an inconclusive argument about which of them was the bigger nerd which devolved into an argument on _if_ they were nerds. Results were unclear, but they’re tipping in favor of Agent Peter being the nerd of the pair.”

Diana rolled her eyes as she claimed a chair near the bed, a smile growing on her face. “Don’t let them fool you, Matt, they’re both nerds.”

“They really are,” El agreed, sitting next to her and pulling her chair as close to the bed as it could get.

Jones scoffed, claiming his own seat on the other side of the bed. “I went to Harvard, and these two are the biggest nerds I’ve ever met.”

Matt laughed as he set the chart back on its hook. “Noted, I’ll tell the other nurses on the floor we have definitive results. Is there anything I can help with before I go?”

“When will Neal be able to leave?” El asked, worrying at her bottom lip.

“It’ll depend on his infection,” Matt said candidly. “Once his fever’s not a risk he won’t need the ICU, but he might get moved to another floor for a day or two.”

They nodded their understanding.

“Is anyone going to try to kick Peter out?” Jones asked, glancing at the sleeping pair on the bed.

“Uh, no,” Matt said definitively. “We have learned that lesson. We tried to separate them a couple of times and neither were overly susceptible to the idea. Even once he fell asleep, our patient became noticeably distressed if we disconnected them, and it’s easier on his system right now if we keep his stress to a minimum. Agent Peter will be welcome as long as he wants to stay.”

El smiled at her husband.

“So he’ll be here the whole time then,” she said fondly.

Matt chuckled softly, heading towards the door.

He hesitated before he reached for the door handle, turning back to face the room.

“I apologize if I’m overstepping my bounds,” he started, “but I promised the other nurses on the floor I’d ask. We saw how protective Agent Peter is and we were wondering, did he basically adopt Neal as his son before or after Neal became his CI?”

The room’s conscious occupants all laughed, harder than they would have if not fueled by their exhausted relief, the hilarity doubling when they exchanged glances and then looked at the two on the bed.

“It's hard to say,” El answered once she regained the ability to speak. “I personally think it was right before, but either way, it was more like Neal adopted Peter as his dad and Peter didn’t have much of a say in it. 

Of course, once someone gets him in the protective mindset he goes all out. I don’t think Neal understood quite how much of an overprotective dad Peter could be when he started this whole arrangement.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” Jones muttered, sending the trio back into peals of laughter. 

“Right before it is, then, ma’am,” the nurse decided sending El a bright smile.

She chuckled and nodded approvingly. 

“I need to check on my other patients,” he said, reaching for the door handle, “but if you need anything, don’t hesitate to push the call button.” 

“Thank you, Matt,” El said sincerely. 

“Of course,” he smiled, disappearing around the corner and shutting the door with a quiet click. 

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Two days later, Diana stepped out of the hospital elevator, Jones in tow, to visit her favorite criminal. He'd been in the ICU for two and a half days, thankfully able to keep his private room after the hospital understood the circumstances of his injuries.

It had been a long two days, but from Peter's morning report, it sounded like Neal was finally on the up-swing. His fever was still holding on, though thankfully not as high, and his ribs and other injuries still mandated pain killers, but his wrists were on the mend and the bruises on his face had finally started to fade.

"I'll bet you ten bucks Peter's in there when we get to the room," Jones said, a friendly challenge in his voice.

Diana scoffed, signing into the visitor log and raising a hand in greeting to the nurse behind the desk.

"Jones, anyone who takes that bet deserves for you to rob them of their hard earned money," she informed him bluntly.

"Darn," Jones chuckled, bending to sign in as well, "I was hoping that seven o'clock meeting made you tired enough to fall for that."

She laughed at him, lightly shoving his shoulder as they made their way down the hall.

"I could have pulled an all-nighter and I wouldn't be tired enough to fall for that."

"That's just because you're freakishly awake after all-nighters," Jones muttered petulantly, but he sent her a grin when she looked his way in disbelief.

"Jones," she said matter-of-factly, "you don't have to be fully awake to remember basic life truths. The sun is hot, water is wet, and Peter's going to be in that room until Neal's fever breaks."

Jones huffed a laugh. "Yeah, that's fair," he acknowledged, gesturing for her to walk into the room first.

Shaking her head in fond amusement, she knocked lightly then pulled the door open quietly, peeking into the room.

“Diana’s here to see you,” Peter told Neal, waving her in as she swung the door open wider and rounded the doorframe.

“She’s terrifying. I like her,” Neal informed Peter in what he clearly thought was a confidential whisper.

“She is,” Peter agreed, exchanging a grin with Diana and noticing Jones had followed her in. “Jones is here too.”

“Jones!” Neal repeated excitedly. “He’s nice... and funny. I like Jones.”

Before Peter could respond, a woman bustled into the room behind them, a cheerful smile on her face.

“Hi," she greeted the room with a friendly wave, then focused in on Neal. "I’m your day nurse, Jessica.”

“Hi!” Neal chirped brightly. “Want to know a secret?”

Peter shook his head emphatically in the background, but the nurse grinned and said, “Sure, honey, what’s the secret?”

“I really like my FBI friends,” Neal told her, “and sometimes I pretend they’re actually friends instead of only hanging out with me to make sure I don’t run away and be a criminal again.”

She tensed slightly but didn’t stop doing her job. She cast Peter a furtive look, and he mouthed ‘nonviolent’ over Neal’s rambling head. The nurse nodded, some of the tension falling away from her shoulders as she continued to listen to her drugged patient.

“Mozzie says I have Stockholm syndrome,” he continued with an earnestness that did not match the words he was saying, “but I really like my FBI crew.”

“Really?” The nurse asked, humoring him as she continued taking his stats.

Peter watched her closely and she did seem to be enjoying his rambling explanation, so he let Neal continue his drugged stream of consciousness.

“Yeah. And El,” Neal confided, “but she’s basically FBI, she counts. And June. And Peter, especially Peter. Peter’s my favorite –“

Neal stopped talking, his eyes going wide.

“Peter is my favorite person,” he gasped, as if he had just come to an earth-shattering realization.

Looking at her stunned boss, Diana thought maybe he had.

“Why?” Diana asked, unable to resist stirring the pot.

“Because he’s Peter,” Neal said as if that explained everything. “He cares, no one has ever really cared before. Well, Mozzie cared, but not enough to doooooo something. Peter does lots of things. 

He saves me a lot. Like _a lot_ a lot. And he saves me on cases even when I do _really_ stupid things, and he says I do good work. No one’s ever told me I did good on something that wasn’t a con before, maybe crime isn’t the only thing I’m good at. He said he was proud of me! And he makes me eat food when I forget, and gives me rides home so I don’t have to take a cab...”

“It sounds like Peter takes good care of you,” the nurse said, casting a quick smile at the blushing FBI agent.

“Yeah, he does,” Neal agreed. “I love Peter. Peter’s great. He’s the best FBI dad in the world.”

Jones let out a strangled laugh, doing his best to disguise it as a cough, but accidentally alerted Neal to the fact that other people were in the room, which he seemed to have forgotten as he talked to the nurse.

“Peter!” Neal exclaimed in overjoyed excitement.

“Hey, bud,” Peter said, trying to recover himself.

“You came!”

“I’ll always come,” Peter said automatically.

Neal nodded in agreement, hero worship evident on his face.

“No one’s ever come before,” Neal informed him solemnly, big eyes staring at Peter and making Neal look decades younger.

“Well now you have lots of people that will come,” Peter said firmly.

Neal smiled happily and swung back to talk to his nurse.

“Peter keeps me safe,” he told Jessica earnestly.

“He tries,” Peter said guilty

“No, he does!” Neal insisted to the nurse as if she had been the one to refute him. “I told those idiots he was coming, and they said the FBI wouldn’t care about a criminal like me, but I told them Peter would. Peter cares and he’s coming and then he did!”

He paused, as if he still could not believe that had happened.

“He’s nonviolent,” Peter reiterated the nurse while Neal contemplated being rescued, “would it be ok if the three of us step over there and discuss how the case is going?” Peter asked, waving a hand at the far corner.

“Yeah, that’s fine,” she smiled, hanging a new IV bag.

“Thank you,” Peter told her, then he turned to Neal and put a hand on his shoulder.

“Neal,” he said, pausing until Neal blinked up at him, waiting for him to continue. “Neal I’ll be over there, alright? I’m coming back, ok?”

Neal nodded up at him with a wide smile.

“Ok,” he chirped.

“Good,” Peter said, squeezing his shoulder one more time before he ushered Diana and Jones to the far corner.

“So, what’s the latest?” he asked once they were out of earshot of the nurse and the still babbling Neal. 

“The latest is that he is _very_ high,” Jones said with a grin in the direction of the bed. 

Peter huffed a laugh and shook his head, rubbing his forehead. “That is not new,” he assured the pair. 

Diana and Jones let out stifled sniggers, but refocused when Peter stared at them expectantly. 

“As expected, they’ve all lawyered up,” Diana started, and Peter nodded seriously, not at all surprised. “There are, however, quite a few of them who are jumping on the chance to rat on the others, so we should have a solid case by the time we’re done.” 

“Good,” Peter said firmly, looking forward to the day when the people responsible for his consultant’s condition were locked away behind bars. 

“Diana and I were talking on the way over,” Jones added, “and we think they were stashing some of the guns we couldn’t find in the warehouse in the back of their restaurant down on Lexington.” 

“Good,” Peter praised, including both of them in his nod, “you’ll get the warrant in today?” 

They both nodded. 

“We’re headed there next,” Jones said. “I started the paperwork in the car, should have it done by the time we get to the courthouse.” 

“Good job, you two. Thank you,” Peter said, relaxing a little at the good news. 

“Of course, Boss,” Diana waved off. “Now, tell us honestly, how’s he doing? Two and a half days is a long time to still be on this level of pain meds, and he _still_ hasn’t kicked that fever. He’s going to be ok, right?” 

“Yeah,” Peter nodded reassuringly, smiling at both of them. “He really is getting better. The fever’s coming down every time they check. Pain and stress on the system can apparently cause fever spikes, so they delayed switching his pain meds until he fully kicks it, but he really is on the road to recovery.” 

His agents let out twin sighs of relief, glancing over at the bed as Neal nodded sincerely at the chuckling nurse. 

“Good,” Jones said emphatically. 

“Yeah,” Peter agreed. “Do you guys want to stay and visit? He can stay awake for a while at a time now.” 

“Nah,” Diana said regretfully. “We want to get that warrant in early in case we need to argue with the judge, and then Jones and I have a meeting with the DoJ to discuss what deals we can offer.” 

Peter nodded his acceptance. 

“Ok, good. Thank you, you two, for handling it.” 

“No problem, Peter,” Jones said lightly. “We do probably have enough time to say bye though, don’t want Mr. Morphine over there to think we disappeared or something.” 

Peter huffed a laugh but obligingly gestured for them to lead the way back to the bed. 

“You just want another chance to laugh at high-as-a-kite-Neal before debonair-gentleman-Neal returns,” Peter said knowingly. 

“Yes, I do,” Jones said with a grin, completely unrepentant. 

“Is he always like this when he’s high?” Diana asked, amusement dancing in her eyes as she watched Neal flap a hand to make a point and distract himself when he caught sight of the medical bracelet on his wrist. 

He stared at it in confusion for a long second before he shrugged it off and resumed his conversation with the nurse as if nothing had happened. 

“I’ve only seen him high two other times,” Peter said in an undertone as he watched Neal fondly, “but yeah, he definitely is.” 

They moved closer to the bed, but Neal didn’t notice, distracted by what he was telling Jessica. 

“ -and if I do really good,” he was saying excitedly, “Peter pats my shoulder. One time he even gave me a hug. I like hugs. And shoulder pats. And dogs, he has a really cute dog named Satchmo. I was going to bribe him with treats to make him like me, but he already liked me! And Elizabeth liked me too! The Burkes are magical,” he finished earnestly.

The nurse chuckled indulgently and pat his hand.

“They sound like wonderful people, honey. Is there anything you need before I check the next room?”

Neal shook his head, smiling brightly at her.

She nodded toward the trio. “It looks like you have visitors.”

Neal turned to look.

“Peter!” he cried excitedly when his eyes focused enough to make out who was standing nearby, apparently not remembering Peter had been in the room with him all morning.

Peter rolled his eyes and huffed a laugh, walking closer to the bed.

“Hey, Neal,” he greeted, taking his previous seat, unsurprised when Neal snagged his hand as soon as he came near enough.

  
  


Diana laughed, stepping to the side so Jessica could squeeze past to leave the room.

“Well, it looks like you’re set, Boss. We’ll head to the courthouse and get that going, and we’ll let everyone know he’s doing ok.”

Peter nodded his acceptance, chuckling as Neal continued to talk to him in the background.

“Let us know if you need us to bring you anything, FBI dad,” Jones added with a smirk.

Peter narrowed his eyes and pointed commandingly at the door before he let his face soften into a smile as he turned back to Neal.

He pointedly ignored his laughing agents as they walked toward the door, but sent them a small wave when they called their goodbyes.

Peter chuckled as he turned his full attention back to Neal, trying to figure out what he was talking about.

Peter settled back in his chair, letting Neal hold his hand, and smiled.  


  
They had found him. He was awake and talking and going to be ok. Finally, after so many long, stressful days, the world started to click back into place.


	10. Recounting The Days

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for the kudos and the amazingly kind comments!! I appreciate them so much!

“His infection is down, and his ribs are looking good,” Neal’s nurse, Matt, told Peter. “We’re going to wean him off the pain medication over the next few hours and -"

“Wait,” Peter cut in, looking alarmed, "you're just taking him off pain meds? You said between the wrists and his ribs he’d still be in pain for weeks.”

“You're right,” Matt agreed with a nod, “I should have said that differently. We're weaning him off the pain killers he's currently on and starting him on a less intense, less potentially addictive pain medication, he'll still have pain meds, don’t worry."

“Oh, ok,” Peter said, vaguely embarrassed. “Right, sorry, what else were you saying?

"No, it's all good,” the nurse assured, “ask questions if you have them, that's what I’m here for."

He moved around the bed to make a note of Neal’s vitals on his chart.

“So, we're switching him off the narcotic pain meds today and his fever is broken, so he should be more lucid the next time he wakes up. Don’t worry if he can't remember most of the past couple days, that's a common side effect of hospital grade pain meds.”

He returned the chart to its hook on the wall and gestured to the paper cups he had set on the table when he came in.

  
  


“Most patients find they're thirsty when they come off of them and I've set these cups aside for you, he can have as much water as he wants, there are ice chips at the nurse station if he'd prefer that. If he's still in considerable pain, hit that call button and we'll come adjust things for him.”

"Ok," Peter said, looking vaguely overwhelmed. "Thanks Matt, we appreciate all the work you've done.”

  
  


"No problem, Agent Peter," he smiled.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Neal blinked awake, groaning.

A hand was on his shoulder, big and warm. Someone was touching him, someone he didn’t know, someone -, oh, wait. Neal blinked again, trying to focus on the person next to his bed.

Oh. He relaxed again. It was Peter. No need to panic then.

“Neal," Peter said softly, "how we doing, buddy? Is your pain level ok?"

Neal grunted, taking a sip from the cup Peter offered him. He laid back, covering his eyes with his arm as he tried to remember.

“What happened?” he rasped out, hoping Peter could hear him without him having to move his arm.

“What's the last thing you remember?" Peter asked, still in a whisper, which Neal was inexpressibly grateful for.

He reclaimed the cup and took another sip as he tried to remember. His head was pounding in time with his heartbeat, but as he drank more water it began to fade.

"I..." his brow furrowed in concentration. "I was with … them, and then you were there? And... and -," he pushed his foggy mind further, absently handing the cup back to Peter. "And we were in an ambulance, and then ... and then I was in a room? And then you were there and we were in a different room? And.... did we have a debate about how much of a nerd you are?"

The pieces were hazy and confusing, but that last part he was almost sure of.

Peter chuckled quietly, nudging Neal's arm with a cup. Neal took it, and even better than water, this time it had ice chips in it. How had Peter put ice chips in it when there had still been water in it when Neal handed it to him?

Neal squinted at Peter who was also holding a … oh, they were different cups. That made sense. Maybe he was on more pain meds than he had thought.

"We did," Peter confirmed. "You lost, by the way."

Neal huffed a laugh as he handed the cup back and collapsed back onto the bed, covering his eyes from the light again.

“That can’t possibly be right,” he informed his handler.

"Oh, it is,” Peter insisted, keeping his voice low in an oddly considerate gesture.

Neal chuckled again, his foggy brain refusing to provide him with a witty comeback.

"You know," he said after a moment, "considering all the fun I had with them, I thought I'd feel worse when I woke up."

"Which time?" Peter asked teasingly. "You didn't feel great the first time you woke up.”

Neal pulled his arm away to squint at Peter's smirking face.

"First time?" he asked, a feeling of dread growing as Peter's smirk grew.

“Yeah, the first time,” Peter confirmed. “Neal, it's Saturday, you've been high on pain meds for three days.”

"What?" Neal demanded, his eyes widening as he stared at Peter. "What do you mean it's been three days? I was awake? Did I talk to people? I don't remember anything!”

"Hey," Peter cut over his increasingly panicked questions, laying a calming hand on his chest. "Hey Neal, I need you to calm down, bud. Just breathe, I’ll answer all your questions.”

Neal let Peter's calming voice wash over him and tried to get a hold of his surging anxiety.

"I don't like not remembering," Neal muttered, closing his eyes as he attempted to get his breathing under control.

"I know, Neal, I know," Peter said, warm and soothing.

Neal cracked an eye to look at him.

Maybe it really had been three days. Peter looked tired. He acted tired, too. He was being softer than normal, not that Neal was opposed, of course.

Normally his reassurance would be tempered by a teasing remark or a 'cowboy up', but now Peter was doing nothing to hide his affection and it was.... nice, it was really nice.

Neal let himself relax, one of his hands coming up almost without his permission to clutch the hand Peter still held on his chest. Neal frowned at it, surprised with himself.

Peter was allowing it, though, so Neal wasn't going to complain.

"How many times have I been awake before this?"

Peter glanced up at the ceiling as he cast his mind back.

"Well," he started, trying to think past his own exhaustion.

On closer inspection, Neal could see he really was exhausted, not just tired. He had an exhausted looseness to his movements and deep bags under his eyes. Maybe Neal should tell him to go home.

His anxiety spiked at the thought, and the selfish side of Neal wanted to demand Peter stay and protect him, but he pushed it down before the words escaped his mouth.

"The White Collar agents all tried to come after they secured the scene," Peter said, interrupting Neal's spiraling thoughts, "but we were firmly told that exceeded visiting limitations, so they didn't get to see you. You woke up Wednesday morning, briefly, didn’t really say much, just wanted to know what happened and went back to sleep.

You woke up again later that afternoon when the doctor unwrapped your ribs, we can't keep them wrapped too long, you’ll get pneumonia. You thought that was a really fun word to say, but didn't really add a lot to the conversation, your fever was high, dangerously high, and you passed out again fairly quickly.

They woke you up that night trying to get your fever down, it spiked at two AM and they had to get a cooled IV drip and compresses. You were awake but not comfortable, didn't have a lot to say.

Thursday morning they made you get up to eat some jello, and you repeatedly informed me jello shouldn't be considered real food, and I needed to arrest whoever invented lime jello, because it's the worst of the lot. I told you I didn't know who invented it, and you informed me I worked at the FBI, and they have lots of resources, but eventually we got you to eat it."

Neal chuckled, sinking back into the bed. He appreciated the details of what they had talked about, glad Peter understood his need to know what happened during his unaccounted-for time. He was also grateful for the casual paraphrasing, thankful beyond words Peter wasn't taking the opportunity to make fun of him for whatever he had said when his filter was down.

"I stand by that,” he muttered. "Jello is gross, lime jello is the grossest."

"So I've heard," Peter noted wryly. "They woke you up again for lunch, this time it was soup, which you liked better. You stayed up for about an hour, attempting to teach me the fine art of slipping out of handcuffs, eventually realizing we didn't have any handcuffs right before you fell asleep again.

June came just before dinner, snuck you in some of those ritzy crackers you like. Ruined your appetite and left before they came in and tried to force more jello on you, so it somehow became my problem. Remind me to thank her for that."

Neal snorted, picturing how that confrontation would go. Peter was delusional if he thought he could actually scold June about anything, the woman had the confidence of a Greek goddess, and it wasn't undeserved.

"Diana and Jones had been popping in periodically," Peter went on, "but the first time you were awake was Friday morning. You told us Diana is scary and Jones is funny and you like them both."

Neal felt a blush trying to rise in his cheeks.

“Could be worse, I guess," he allowed. "What'd they say?”

"Diana considers it a badge of honor that you like and fear her. Jones is debating it's better to be liked than feared, so they've been sniping back and forth on that one ever since.”

Neal snorted. "I'm sure everyone in the office appreciates that.“

"Oh, like you wouldn't believe," Peter agreed with a chuckle. "The rest of them keep trying to sneak out of work on their lunch breaks to ask you if you like them, but Reese has scared almost everybody into submission on that front, so you're safe there."

Neal laughed in disbelief, opening his eyes to study Peter's face. All he found was a grin, no signs of a lie in his expression.

Neal laughed again, picturing Reese’s lecture for anyone who dared disobey him.

"I bet he's thrilled,” Neal said.

"Oh yeah," Peter agreed sarcastically. "You would not believe the number of agents that tried to convince him a white-collar crime was going down on this block. Next time they're here, ask Diana and Jones to give you their rendition of how it went down, it's hysterical."

"So then what?" Neal prodded when Peter didn't go on.

"Oh, right," Peter shook himself slightly, subtly trying to wake himself up, not that his discretion actually hid anything from Neal.

One of these days, Peter was going to learn that Neal was actually very observant, especially regarding his handler, but today was not that day.

"So that puts us at..." Peter trailed off as he concentrated.

"Friday morning,” Neal supplied.

"Right, Friday morning," Peter agreed. "El came by before work to see you again, but you were asleep.  


A pigeon somehow found its way to your room. The hospital staff took it and put it back outside before I could get the scroll off its leg. I suspect that bouquet," he pointed to a bouquet by the window with a bizarre collection of flowers and leaves, "is from the same sender.”

Neal smiled fondly. Good old Mozzie.

"It's-," he started to explain.

"Flower code, I know," Peter finished for him. " I'm not sure if I'm the tyrant or if the hospital is, but either way he has a rescue plan for you if you want it. Which you don't," he finished sternly.

"Oh please," Neal scoffed, feeling his own exhaustion start creeping in. "Even if I wanted to leave, which I don't, we both know you'd find me in, like, a day flat."

"Glad we’re on the same page," Peter said smugly. Neal squinted at him. He was lucky Neal was too tired to banter with him.

"What else?" Neal asked, his eyes slipping shut.

"Well, late Friday morning brought round three of the great jello debacle, but this time it was strawberry and you ate it with minimal complaint. El came on her lunch break and you told her about how much you love her dinners, so expect a tidal wave of invites when you're out of the hospital.”

"That's the opposite of a problem,” Neal mumbled, sleep threatening to pull him under again.

"June came back while El was in and you told her if you were under eighteen you would have given her adoption papers. She told you she would have signed them.”

Neal's eyes snapped open and he stared at Peter in horror.

"I did what?" he asked in a strangled whisper.

"Don't worry about it,” Peter waved off easily, "it's nothing anyone didn't already know.”

"Oh god," Neal moaned, pulling the covers up over his face. "What else did I do?"

"Well, you fell asleep after that, but woke up for a late lunch just in time for Reese to come visit you. His visit was short, he just wanted to make sure you were ok. You told him you liked working with the FBI and you weren't planning to run away, and he told you that was good, he'd be disappointed if he had to arrest you."

Neal lowered the blanket just enough to peek out at Peter with wide eyes. It was no secret between them that Neal was still mildly terrified of Hughes and the power the man had over his deal.

"Relax," Peter reassured, squeezing Neal's hand, "you didn't say anything bad or incriminating."

Neal glanced at Peter's hand, he'd forgotten he was still holding it. It was surprisingly comforting, and he added it to the list of things he was thankful for.

"You're sure?" he asked Peter, still not sure where he stood with the ASAC, even after years of working under him.

"I'm sure,” Peter said firmly. "I wouldn't have let you say anything incriminating when you’re drugged. To be clear, any other day, I'm not going to stop you, but it's not fair while you're drugged and fevered."

Neal nodded, sighing in relief.

"Thanks, Peter,” he muttered, his eyes slipping shut again. How was he this tired still? He'd just woken up, he should be able to last a whole conversation before needing a nap.

"Did he say anything else?" he asked when Peter didn't go on.

"He said he was worried about you, and that Agent Warner made the wrong call," Peter said, dropping his voice to a quiet murmur.

Neal tried to scowl, which was made more difficult when his eyes refused to open, but he worked with what he had.

Peter chuckled, but Neal knew what he was doing. He was trying to lull him back to sleep, but Neal wanted to know about the time he had missed, and even Peter's stupidly soothing voice wasn't going to stop him.

"What else?" he demanded, his sleepy slur not quite as commanding as he had hoped.

Evidently Peter agreed, because he chuckled again before he continued, his other hand finding its way to Neal's hair, gently carding through the loose curls. Neal sunk into the bed, mentally grumbling about underhanded tactics. That had no right to feel as good as it did.

"After Reese left, you ate, informed me he scared you, worried a little bit that telling him you weren't planning on running would make him think you were planning on running, and I told you he didn't think that.  


You woke up one more time when your nurse, Matt, was in here. You told him he was your favorite Matt because you knew a mean Matt, but not to worry because Nurse Matt, that's what you call him, isn't mean. Don't freak out, you didn't say why you don't like Keller and Nurse Matt didn't ask.    
  


You told him he was good at his job and then gave several examples that didn't correlate to nursing at all, such as you realizing he bikes to work because he tries to go green."

"Still savin' th’ world,”Neal muttered, trying to push away sleep long enough to finish his point. "Th't's wh't n’rses do, P'ter.”

"Hmm," Peter hummed noncommittally. "We’ll finish the debate later, go to sleep, Neal."

"Stay?" he whispered before he could stop himself.

"I'll be here the whole time, Neal, I promise,” Peter said, firm and sure.

Neal twitched a smile and let himself surrender to sleep, confident Peter would keep him safe.


	11. Letting Sleeping Handlers Lie

"Peter?" Neal asked, trying to blink the sleep out of his eyes.

There was no answer and Neal snapped into alertness. Peter had said he'd protect him, if he wasn't here then -, oh. Oh. Peter was there, he was just asleep, slumped in a chair pulled up close to the bed Neal was laying on.

Neal let himself breathe out his panic as he smiled fondly at his handler.

Neal peered at the buttons on the bed, surely one of these had to... there it was. He pressed the button and half the bed rose until Neal was sitting up, resituating to adjust for his protesting ribs.

Once resettled, he cast his mind around for something to do now that he was sitting up. He couldn't watch the tv, Peter was asleep, and one glance told Neal that Peter was still tired. More than that, he was exhausted.

Neal had seen Peter after an all nighter, he'd even seen him after consecutive near-all-nighters, and he had never looked this tired before.

Neal cocked his head, considering his handler.  


Neal had apparently been out for most of three days, but Peter had surely slept in between the few times Neal had been awake, so why did he still look so exhausted?  


Granted, hospital chairs weren’t comfortable, and he would have been woken up often by the hustle and bustle of the hospital... 

Neal eventually chalked it up to the added worry and stress and continued his search for entertainment to occupy him while he waited for Peter wake up.

Waking Peter up for some company was out of the question, but that left Neal with limited entertainment options and he peered at the bedside table in search of a book or sketchpad.

The door swung open, steady and quiet, and Neal watched warily as someone slipped inside.

It was June. Neal beamed at her when he registered who she was, relaxing back into his pillows and waving a hand in greeting.

Beside him, Peter sprung to his feet, stepping protectively between Neal and the door.

Neal stared in shock, but June seemed to have expected this reaction.

"Relax, Peter," she said, gently pushing his chest until he collapsed back into his chair. "It's only me, go back to sleep."

Peter blinked at her in hazy confusion, exhaustion crashing over him once the adrenaline had dissipated.

She gently nudged him forward until he slumped back onto the edge of Neal's bed, head pillowed in his own arm.

"Sleep,” she said firmly, and he followed her direction almost instantly.

"Wow," Neal muttered, surprised by the level Peter had taken his protection detail to. "Does he always do that when someone comes in?"

"Yes,” June sighed fondly, hanging her bag on a hook near the door. "He wakes up every time the door opens. It doesn't go as well when he is abruptly woken and doesn't recognize the person entering, he drew his gun on your poor nurse, Ellie.”

"Did he really?" Neal asked in horrified delight. "Did she quit on the spot?"

"No, of course not, nurses are made of sterner stuff than that, dear. She told him she was a nurse not a kidnapper and to put it away and go back to sleep. Thankfully all the staff on the floor know he is FBI.” 

"Wow," Neal said again, impressed with the nurse's nonchalance in the face of an armed and angry Peter.

June nodded her agreement as she settled herself in the chair closest to Neal on the opposite side of the bed Peter was sleeping on.

"It is good to see you off your pain meds, I'm glad you're not in too much pain without them."

"Yeah, it's not bad, I'm still on pain meds, just not ones that make me quite as… high," he finished eventually, unable to find another word.

June smiled at him, patting his hand fondly.

"I’m glad, Neal. I was worried when Peter told me they were taking you off of them, I thought perhaps you should stay on them for another day."

“No," Neal disagreed with a light shake of his head, "I'm glad I’m off them. Peter was filling me in on all of the time I don't remember, and I have to say I'm glad there's not another day's worth of embarrassing stories.”

June frowned. "Was Peter making fun of you?" she asked, casting a disappointed look at the sleeping man.

"No, no, nothing like that,” Neal hurried to assure her. "Actually, Peter's been really... he's been really nice about the whole thing. He didn't make fun of whatever ridiculous things I said when I was high, he let me hold his hand," Neal blushed as the last part popped out, he hadn't been intending to share that tidbit with anyone, but at least it was June not someone like Mozzie.

"It's been weird," Neal continued, hoping to slide by the last part without comment, "not bad, just weird."

"Well, Neal,” June said, “Peter has been very worried. We all have been."

Neal watched his sleeping handler for a moment.

"Yeah, I guess so,” Neal agreed eventually.

“There is no need to guess, young man,” June informed him in a teasingly scolding voice. "We were all incredibly worried, but none of us compared to that man right there. 

Did you know he slept at the Bureau when you were missing? Only when they could force him, mind you. Agent Berrigan told me they had to call Elizabeth in to convince him to take a nap, and even then it was only for three hours, and that was the only time they could make him sleep the whole four horrible days you were gone. 

He worked around the clock, lived in that conference room staring at the evidence board when he wasn't out chasing a lead."

Neal looked at her with wide eyes as he absorbed that. He cast another look at his handler, feeling a wave of affection for him as he finally understood why Peter was so exhausted.

"I’m surprised Hughes didn't send him home,” Neal said lightly, still studying Peter's sleeping face.

"Well," June said, leaning in to whisper even though there was no one else except the sleeping agent in the room with them. "You didn't hear this from me, but Agent Berrigan told me he tried. Apparently Peter informed his boss that Peter could either work on your case at work, or his boss could send him home and he would work on it in his free time with less ability to keep everyone in the loop, so his boss allowed him to stay.”

Neal stared at her as he tried to picture that scene.

"Really?" he breathed, in awe of Peter's willingness to stand up to Hughes, who still incited a unique kind of terror in Neal every time he talked to the man one on one.

June nodded, sitting back in her seat with a mischievous grin.

Neal swallowed hard, touched by Peter's dedication. If they kept talking about it, he was afraid he may cry, so he cast his mind around for another topic of discussion.

"Peter told me I started telling you I'd ask you to adopt me, I'm sorry if I made you feel awkward,” he said, deciding to get the awkwardness out of the way first so it didn't hang over the conversation as he got up the nerve to bring it up.

“Don't you worry about that, dear," June waved away his apology, "it wasn't awkward at all. I was touched, truth be told."

Neal tried to push down the blush he could feel rising in his cheeks, but from June’s smothered grin, he doubted he was successful.

"Thanks, June," he said, wondering, not for the first time, how he had gotten lucky enough to get to have her in his life.

“Nonsense," June scoffed, "no thanks needed. It would be an honor to be your grandmother.”

"Grandmother?" Neal repeated, confused.

"Yes, you asked if you could adopt me as your grandmother. You assured me I am young and beautiful, but you couldn't have two adopted moms if you were going to have an adopted dad as well."

"I did what?" Neal demanded, sitting up straighter and leaning toward her urgently. "Who did I ask to adopt me? Please tell me it wasn't Jones and Diana.”

"No, of course not,” she scoffed, “you asked Peter and Elizabeth.”

Neal's mouth dropped open in shock.

"What?" he gasped.

"I suppose Peter left that tidbit out of his retelling?" she asked, sending a fond look at the sleeping man.

Neal nodded dumbly.

"What did they say?" he asked in a horrified whisper.

"Elizabeth said they would love to adopt you, and Peter told Elizabeth in a voice he clearly thought I couldn't hear that, and I quote, 'I thought we already had’.”

"Did he really?" Neal asked, blindsided by Peter's lack of denial.

"Well, of course," June said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

It might have been to her, but it certainly wasn't to Neal. 

He may have, on occasion, privately speculated to himself in the secrecy of his own mind that some days with Peter felt like what he imagined spending time with a father might be like, but he had never intended to admit that out loud.

There was just something about Peter, though. The gentle teasing, the general guidance, the repeated rescuing of Neal from whatever situation he ended up getting himself in. Even some of the lectures made it into his paternal imaginings, remembering the stories some of his friends had told him in school of dads who yelled and scolded and worried and cared.

He didn't really know what having a dad would be like, his own had taken the cop-killing route instead of the raising-his-son route, but Peter fit into his daydreams about having a father alarmingly well.

Peter may be Neal's ideal dad, but Neal was a boy who had always desperately longed for a father, Peter wasn't a man who had always wanted a son.

Neal had never even entertained the possibility that Peter felt the same connection he did.

"Neal," June said, vaguely exasperated, "the man quite literally hangs up the artwork you give him as if he is a parent proudly showing off his son's talent. The last time I was at the Burkes’ lovely home, do you know what I noticed on their mantle? A beautiful painting that I seem to remember _you_ painting Peter for his birthday.”

"Well, yeah," Neal admitted reluctantly, "but it was of Elizabeth, of course he hung it up, he adores her.”

“Yes," June agreed, "it was _of_ her and _from_ you. If I had to hazard a guess, I'd wager that painting is one of Peter Burke's most prized physical possessions."

Neal stared at her in shock, unable to formulate a response to that.

She chuckled lightly and pat his hand again.

"Oh, come now, this can't come as a surprise to you," June chided gently. “Peter adopted you almost immediately. It was clear to me by his third visit that he had mentally signed the paperwork, are you honestly telling me you didn't notice?"

"I mean, I knew he cared," Neal defended weakly, still struggling to wrap his mind around the revelations June was presenting so casually. "But he’s Peter, he cares about everyone. That's not the same as... as…”

June rolled her eyes at him, which seemed incredibly unfair given how blindsided Neal was feeling. How was Neal supposed to have known?

"For a young man so brilliant, sometimes you miss the things right in front of your nose, Neal," she sighed, shaking her head. "Peter does care about everyone, it's one of his best features, but he doesn't just _care_ about you, he parents you, and it's time you acknowledge that.”

"He doesn’t - ,' Neal started to protest before June cut him off with a stern look.

"He does," she said firmly. "He proudly hangs your artwork up for the world to see, he praises when you do well, squeezes your arm and pats your back when you need encouragement, listens to your problems, worries about your safety and your future, answers your calls anytime day or night, the list goes on and on. Not to mention, the man brags on you like you would not believe when you're not there to get an ego boost from it. I should record him sometime, you would not believe how much he has to say."

"Really?" Neal whispered, wanting so badly for it to be true.

"Really, my dear," June confirmed. "Not to mention how frantic he has been this last week. He has not left this room, not once in three days. 

Thankfully, once they understood the circumstances of your injuries they gave you this private room instead of the usual hospital room, I don't even want to think of the panic he would have driven himself to if he had to leave the room every time he needed to use the restroom."

"The whole time?" Neal asked, touched.

"Yes, he hasn't left once. We all tried to make him go home but he wouldn't hear it. Elizabeth brought him a bag," she waved her hand at the duffle bag tucked under the chair in the far corner, "and he has been living out of it ever since.”

"Oh," Neal said simply, stunned.

“Yes, oh,” June agreed lightly, a warm smile on her face. "Something for you to think on, I believe. For now, I come bearing gifts!"

"Gifts?" Neal asked, eagerly taking the change in subject.

“Yes, of course," June said as she stood and retrieved the bag she had hung by the door.

"No hospital visit is complete without gifts," she declared, sitting back down and unzipping her bag.

Neal perked up as he tried to steal a peak into the bag, excited by the possibilities of what she might have brought him.

“Well, first off, I brought you this,” June said, pulling a full sized sketch pad out of her large bag and handing it to him. “I know how much you like to draw if you can’t be up and about, and I can’t imagine you’ll be out of that bed very often in the next few days.” 

“June,” Neal breathed, taking the sketch pad reverently and running a hand down the cover. “You are an _angel_ , thank you.” 

“Oh, don’t worry about it, dear,” she waved off with a warm smile, reaching back into her bag. 

“I’ll have to ask Peter grab me a pen or something from the nurses station when he wakes up,” Neal commented, flipping through the beautifully untouched pages of his new sketch pad.

“Neal,” she scoffed, pulling out a brand new box of artistic pencils sitting atop a full color set of fine-line artist pens. “Why would I bring you a sketch pad and nothing to sketch with?”

Neal blinked at her as he tried to come up with a witty response. 

“I’m going to blame it on the pain meds,” he eventually decided on with a charming smile. 

She shook her head ruefully at him, but moved on to the other goodies she had brought him instead of teasing him further. 

“Samantha went with me,” she explained, piling a few things into her hand inside the bag, well out of sight of Neal’s curious gaze, “and she informed me that for pencil sketches you need an artist eraser, she called it,” June plucked one of the items out of her palm and handed it to Neal, “a pencil sharpener,” which was added to his growing mound of treasures, “and some charcoal pencils, which are apparently very different from the other sketching pencils we got,” she finished, handing him a thin box set.

“June, _thank you_ ,” he said sincerely, hoping she could feel the gratitude pouring off of him. “I can not describe how much you’ve just improved my hospital stay.” 

“Oh, but wait,” she said with a mischievous grin, “there’s _more_.”

She glanced into her bag again, rummaging for a moment to get to the items on the bottom, and Neal took the opportunity to carefully arrange his gifts on his bedside table. 

“These,” June announced, pulling out a box of expensive crackers, “are in case they try to feed you anymore of that nauseating slop, and these,” she produced a small box of individually wrapped high-end chocolates, “are in case they don’t bring dessert!” 

“June,” Neal said in wide eyed amazement, “you are a goddess walking among us.” 

She laughed and tapped his nose with her finger. 

“And don’t you forget it!” she commanded jokingly, pulling one more item from her bag of wonders. “I also brought you this book that I seem to remember you had been in the middle of, and if you happen to glance through it, you may just find a message from a friend of ours, who I am not allowed to name inside these infested walls.” 

Neal laughed, accepting the book and setting it next to his new sketch pad without opening it, knowing the sonnet would take some time to decode and not wanting to waste the precious visiting time with June. 

“I’m surprised he didn’t try to send Stella again,” Neal noted in amusement. 

“Oh, Neal,” June said, vaguely pitying, “he did.” 

Neal barked out a surprised laugh, immediately clapping a hand to his mouth and looking at his sleeping handler, glad to see he hadn’t woken him. 

“Oh don’t worry about him,” June reassured him. “Nothing but the door opening, a scream, or a pained moan can rouse him.”

Neal cast another fond look at Peter, but before he could respond, June went on, standing up and gathering her bag with her. 

“I’m sorry, dear,” she said as she picked up the empty cup next to Neal’s bed and moved to the pitcher of water in the far corner to fill it. “I can’t actually stay long, I need to pick Samantha up from practice. She was so upset she couldn’t come, but I told her she could visit you after you had a chance to come off the pain meds a bit.” 

“Thanks, June, that’s a great idea, I’d love to see her. Tell her I say hi, and I expect to hear tales of her dominating win at next weekend’s game.” 

June pat his hand one last time before walking around the bed, surprising him by walking over to Peter instead of to the door.

"Peter, it's June,” she said, gently shaking Peter’s shoulder until he blinked awake. “I’m going to open the door to leave to pick up my granddaughter. Neal is ok, he's not in pain, and I got him water. There's no one else in the room, you don't have to get up when the door opens, ok?”

"Ok," he mumbled, sounding more asleep than awake.

She nodded, waved at Neal, and made her way quietly out of the room. 

Peter went tense at the sound of the door opening, but didn’t leap to his feet. The lines of tension lasted several seconds after the door closed, then abruptly drained out as he deemed the room safe and fell back to sleep.

Neal watched him with a smile, wondering how he was lucky enough to get a handler like Peter. In between all the bad, he must have done _something_ right. 


	12. Drawing Conclusions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NOTE: I updated TWO chapters in one go, so you may need to go back one if you didn’t see that!
> 
> NOTE2: This chapter contains slight spoilers for season four!
> 
> I hope I didn’t cause any confusion, I updated two chapters at once. I already had the next one edited, so I decided to just load them both up in thanks for the amazingly kind reviews and comments people have left. Thank you so much, they mean so much to me!

Neal sat in silence for several minutes after June left, running over everything she had said in his head.

Peter was still asleep, but Neal now had more than enough ways to stave off boredom, so that wasn’t a problem.

He pulled out his new sketch pad and let his hands move of their own accord while he considered what June had said.

She made a point. Peter was proud of him, the man had told him several times. Peter was proud of him for things that weren’t crimes, he hadn’t had that since Ellen.

There were other people who gave Neal praise, of course. Mozzie, Kate, Addler and Alex to name a few, but they always praised his criminal abilities. His abilities to con and pickpocket and slip into places unnoticed. They never really praised him for anything else.

He had tried on several occasions to show off other talents, but they had never seemed overly impressed.

He had cooked for Kate several times, but she had always remarked how she wished they had the money to go to nice places instead as she ate what he made her. It was why it had taken Diana’s prompting to cook for Sarah.

Cooking for Diana had seemed appropriate. She bought him for a fake date, so he made her a fake nice meal.

But she had liked it, and Sarah had liked it. Every time it came up in conversation Peter complimented his cooking abilities, usually with a grudging sense of wonder that Neal could even pronounce the dishes he made, let alone create them.

Neal liked cooking, it was really just edible art once he got the hang of it, but Kate had never liked it, so he wrote it off as a fun hobby instead of a talent.

He’d cooked for Mozzie a time or two as well, but Mozzie hadn’t commented on the result one way or another, instead distracted by the expensive bottle of wine Neal had stolen for the occasion.

Mozzie wasn’t really interested in Neal's art either, unless it was in regards to forging for a con.

Mozzie was a good friend, he listened to Neal’s problems, helped on cases, got him out of more binds than Neal could count, but it had stung when Mozzie burned a warehouse full of Neal Caffrey originals, shrugging off the question with a comment about how they weren’t his best work.

Neal’s best work would always be in forging other people’s masterpieces, and sometimes that stung too.

It was kind of funny, Neal mused to himself as he sharpened his pencil without registering what he was drawing. June was right, Peter did hang up his artwork.

He had given Peter that painting more because he couldn’t think of anything Peter wanted than because he thought Peter would actually like it.

He had assumed Peter would give a reaction similar to the few times Neal had painted things for Kate; a few idle comments on his brushwork and within a day or two it would disappear, never to be seen again.

Neal tried to push away the memory of the time he found one of his gifts in the trash. It had been the last thing he ever handmade her, after that he gifted her with stolen work rather than his own. She seemed to like that better.

Giving Peter a painting hadn’t gone at all like that, though, and Neal had been blown away by his reaction.

When Peter had unwrapped the painting, he stared at it in open mouthed awe for several long seconds before he croaked out a thank you. He studied every inch of it, noting how beautiful his wife was and how well Neal had captured her.

He had held it like it was amazing, a masterpiece in its own right, and Neal had known it was because of how much Peter loved his wife, but it had filled his chest with warmth to see someone openly admiring an original painting he made.

Neal had looked at it long and hard as he had left that night, certain he would never see it again, but he was wrong. The very next time he had come over, it was up on the mantle.

Peter, Mr. Peter I-don’t-need-to-spend-hard-earned-money-on-artwork-aren’t-pictures-better? Burke had paid for a custom stand and frame and proudly displayed it on his mantle where it could be seen from almost everywhere on the first floor.

Neal had almost cried. He’d waited so long for someone to appreciate his artwork and there was Peter, hanging it up in his living room.

He absently flipped the page to a fresh sheet, drawing something his far away gaze didn’t see.

It was nice, having someone who liked what he made. Someone who praised him, someone who worried about him. Someone who’s only concern when they worried about him was that Neal might get hurt, not that he might blow their score or get caught and rat them out.

Peter worried about Neal. A lot. Maybe more than Neal deserved, considering how often he got himself into the messes that put him at risk. Peter worried and scolded and yelled, but Neal knew down to his bones that if he was in trouble, Peter would save him, no matter what he had done to deserve the situation he was in.

Peter insisted on having his back, even when he didn’t have to. It would be easy for Peter to pass van duty off to other agents, not only because he was the boss, but also because he did more shifts in the van than anyone else on the team.

Neal hadn’t realized how much of a choice it was for Peter to always be the one in the van watching Neal’s undercover assignments until now, but he was indescribably grateful that Peter did. Most of Neal’s casual confidence in undercover work came from the knowledge that Peter was watching and listening and would protect him if something went wrong.

He tried to imagine what going undercover would be like if Peter was back at the office, taking the chance to catch up on paperwork while someone else monitored the van, and shivered.

An image of Agent Rice sprang to mind, closely followed by Agent Warner, and Neal flipped the page with more force than necessary as he tried to shove those thoughts away.

Peter protected him, and Neal was grateful. Peter did more than that though, he included him. He included Neal at White Collar and he included him at home, bringing him to family dinners with El at least five or six times a month, if not more.

Neal loved those dinners. Times they didn’t talk about work, or if they did it was a slightly exaggerated retelling of the day’s adventures at El’s eager demand.

They talked about things that would never come up in the office. The dogs Peter had when he was little, how El used to competitively horseback-ride, how Neal liked to cook. The three of them talked about anything and everything, Satchmo begging at Neal’s feet because he knew Neal was the soft touch of the trio and would slip him scraps if he begged hard enough.

One thing he was glad he had let slip when his filter was non-existent was that he truly loved those dinners. He was looking forward to the promised tidal wave of invites.

He grabbed another pencil from the set June brought him and flipped to a new page, still fondly thinking about the Burke family dinners.

Peter and El invited him over so often that he had a designated seat at the dinner table, reserved for him even when other people were eating with them. Peter had actually stopped _Diana_ from sitting in Neal's spot when she and Jones came to dinner as well. Peter had made a joke about it, but the message was clear, Neal had a spot at the family table, a chair to call his own.

There were a couple of places throughout the house that had become his. The center of the couch, the chair in the back left corner of the back patio.

The hook furthest from the door was reserved for Neal's hat, and El had bought a discreet basket that sat under the coat rack for when he brought a work bag so it didn't get dog hair all over it.

He had a small set of toiletries, phone charger, and a change of clothes in the guest room for the times he fell asleep watching a movie with them after dinner. El had even bought new sheets and pillows for the guest room, noting that if someone was going to be using it, they should be comfortable.

He was glad he had a home with June, but he was also so grateful that the Burkes had carved out a space for him in theirs as well.

He'd gotten so comfortable in their home, eating dinners with them, that sometimes he helped make them too.

He smiled as he flipped to a new sheet in the sketch pad.

When Neal had let it slip he liked to cook, El had been over the moon. She invited him over weekly to try out new recipes with her, or to teach him a long-since perfected family dish. Apparently it wasn't just El that loved Italian, her whole family did, and she'd spent hours teaching him how to roll pasta, make meatballs, and create sauces.

If they ever had a case where he needed to be a professional chef, he wouldn't have a problem thanks to Elizabeth Burke.

The best days were when Peter was there too, and they all laughed and teased and bantered their way through cooking dinner. 

Well, Neal and El cooked, Peter would follow them around as they finished with bowls or ingredients and clean, either washing the dishes they were done with or returning ingredients to their proper places.

That was one of the things Neal loved about Peter, he'd always find a way to help.

Peter was truly terrible at trying to cook the fancy dishes El prepared, his specialty was more the classic comfort foods, but he didn't let that stop him. He was there too, laughing and joking with them, and afterwards they only had to clean their plates and the serving dishes.

Of course, Neal acknowledged, flipping to a new page and sharpening his pencil, Peter could cook in his own right. His specialty was grilling, and Neal hadn’t had any idea how much technique went into grilling steaks until Peter had taught him, but Peter could cook other things as well.

His pot-roast really was delicious, as much as Neal hated to give him more things to brag about. He made surprisingly amazing hamburgers, and a phenomenal pork tenderloin that he cooked for El whenever she finished an event with a big client.

Sometimes Neal tried to help Peter cook, but in much the same way Peter wasn't talented at elaborate, Neal was no good at cooking simple, so he took on the role of cleaning while teasing Peter about the topic of the day.

If El was home that night, she alternated between helping both of them while laughing at their antics.

The Burkes accepted him and took care of him in a way no one ever had before, Neal admitted to himself, absently turning to a fresh page and sharpening his pencil.

When Peter dragged a drugged-out-of-his-mind Neal into their living room, El moved her work meeting so she could sit next to him and change his compresses, get him water, and sing him to sleep. He loved that woman more than words could tell.

Peter cared and took care of him just as much, but El was so much more gentle, so much softer when she did.

When he had the stomach flu, she and Peter insisted Neal come and spend the weekend in their guest room. She'd brought him soup, changed the trashcans without complaint, and sat with him softly humming as he tried to fall asleep.

She stepped in when Peter's lectures got too harsh, reminding him that Neal was trying his best, and people couldn't change overnight. She called him sweetie and lit up when she saw him at the door.

Neal loved her and Peter more than he had ever thought possible, and it was equal parts calming and unnerving that June speculated they felt the same.

And maybe she was right, maybe they did feel the same, he acknowledged to himself, flipping to the next page.

They certainly invested enough of their time in him to make a supporting argument. They didn't just invest time in things that would be helpful for cases or fun for them, either, they both insisted on teaching Neal life skills when they discovered how woefully lacking he was in most adult abilities.

Peter taught him how to replace sinks, faucets, toilets, shower heads. El taught him how to garden, and how to build a raised flowerbed from two by fours. She and Neal had had built the frame one day while Peter was catching up on paperwork and Peter had come home in time to help them finish the final assembly and fill it with soil.

Peter had taught him how to add a light switch to a room, which was somehow both much easier and much more complicated than Neal had expected it to be.

He helped Peter re-stain a wood floor and had been at a complete loss for why they were doing it until he saw the beautiful results of their work.

El taught him how to lay and grout tile floors when the guest bathroom was redone. That had been an experience.

It was funny, Neal had made mosaics before, but it somehow never occurred to him just how much work tile floors were. From that point on he had a new appreciation for the tiled floor of every bathroom he went in.

Neal smiled as he flipped to a new page, thinking about all the things El had taught him.

On the very first case he worked, he had gone to the Burkes’ house when he knew Peter would be getting ready for work because he wanted to meet El, get a read on her without Peter giving her cues.

He had been blown away by her friendliness and instant acceptance. Her fondness was immediate and unexpected, considering he was the person who had stolen so much of her husband's attention, and not to mention a convicted criminal.

He had taken to her instantly, but hadn't tried to hang out with her one on one until she invited him to the house one weekend, looking for someone to have breakfast with when Peter was away.

He snorted, remembering that one. It was a fun weekend full of movies and diagrams drawn on a whiteboard she pulled out of the basement, and it had been the turning point in their relationship.

Elizabeth was an extrovert through and through and Neal made an effort from then on out to spend time with her whenever Peter was called away for the weekend. They baked elaborate breads, watched bad movies, and drank wine until they couldn't walk straight.

They had great times, usually joined by Mozzie when he realized the house was free of The Suit. He and Mozzie taught El all the tricks of poker, and Peter had been dumfounded when she cleaned house at the next game night they went to.

Neal smiled as he flipped to the next page. He really loved the Burkes and June might just be right that they love him back. They certainly invite him to enough movie nights, dinners, and game nights… He went on long walks with them and Satchmo, and sometimes showed up at their house for absolutely no reason except he had wanted to spend time with them.

What was the saying? 'Home is where they have to take you in’?

Well, he had certainly showed up in quite a few less than ideal situations, and he'd never doubted they would let him in.

Running to their house when he was a fugitive sprang to mind.

Peter had been mad, but he hadn't done anything to alert the guards even before Neal convinced him he was framed.

Neal had been planning to leave Peter without saying goodbye, but the man still fought tooth and nail against the Marshals to be allowed to take Neal home with him under supervision that first night after the explosion. Neal doesn't know what he would have done if he hadn't been able to break down in the safety of the Burkes’ house before he returned to prison.

Huh, he decided eventually. June might be onto something.

He set the pencil down on the bedside table and sat back, his own tiredness creeping back in.

He glanced down at his sketchbook, surprised to find a fully drawn and shaded picture on the page. He blinked down at it. It wasn't even the first page.

He vaguely remembered turning pages, but he had apparently filled up almost a dozen sheets as he thought. He flipped to the first page, vaguely disturbed by his lack of memory of what he had just drawn.

It was a picture of Peter. Neal remembered the moment. Peter was standing in the conference room of White Collar, smiling proudly at Neal as he provided the key piece of information for the Benston case.

Huh. Neal flipped the page. Peter again. Peter was sitting in the van, the low light and screens casting sharp shadows on his face. He looked anxious and worried as he watched the surveillance screen.

The screen wasn't detailed, but the image was unmistakably Neal when he had gone undercover to expose the money launderer with a penchant for murdering people who annoyed him.

Neal glanced at his sleeping handler, who still looked worried and tired, and wondered how he had looked when they were combing through clues looking for Neal.

Neal flipped to the next page. Peter again, at this point he shouldn't really be surprised, he supposed. Apparently his hands had followed his thoughts.

Peter, El, and Neal were sitting around the Burkes’ kitchen table, all looking cheerful and happy. Neal’s hand subtly ducked below the table, feeding Satchmo a piece of pot-roast. Behind them, the painting he gave Peter was blurry, but clearly discernible on the mantle.

Neal's eyes traced over their laughing faces. The drawing could have been of any of the dozens of the times he ate dinner at the Burkes’.

He turned to the next page. No people were in this drawing, but it was about the Burkes none-the-less.

In the drawing, Neal's hat was jauntily perched on the corner of the back of the kitchen chair that had become his from the sheer number of times he eaten at their house.

Neal stared at the picture he had no recollection of drawing and wondered if he had really been that deep in thought or if the pain meds were still affecting him more than he realized.

He flipped to the next page as he took in the drawing of he and El at the Burkes’ kitchen counter, both covered in flour and other ingredients as Elizabeth taught Neal how to roll his own pasta.

That had been a wonderful day, just he and El laughing their way through two disastrous attempts and a beautifully rolled third try.

Peter had repeatedly bragged about how good their dinner had been in the office the next day until Diana had eventually gotten annoyed and thrown her stress balls at him until he stopped.

Neal's smile grew as he turned the next page and took in his artwork. It was he and Peter this time, and he remembered this day as well. They were in t-shirts on the Burkes' back patio.

When Peter found out Neal had no idea how to work a bar-b-que, he had mandated that Neal was to come over that Saturday and learn.

It had been more fun than Neal could have imagined, and Peter's proud smile as he told El that Neal had grilled the steaks had actually made him blush.

He studied the drawing for a long moment, wondering if he could convince Peter to bar-b-que with him again when he was released from the hospital.

Neal turned the page and instantly recognized the scene even though he was only partially visible in it. He was laid out on the couch after his disastrous trip to the Howser clinic, most of his head and upper body blocked by El, who was sitting next to him, switching out the cold compresses she laid on his forehead.

Neal tried to think back to if he had thanked her for that. When he couldn't remember, he put it on his to-do list for the next time he saw her.

He flipped the page and chuckled at the sprawling legs of he and Peter, who both had their head and upper body crammed under the Burkes' kitchen sink.

Neal had made one offhand comment to Jones about not understanding plumbing, and Peter had been horrified to learn Neal didn't know basic house maintenance skills.

Neal had pointed out that he had never needed them before, but Peter had insisted that Neal come over every weekend for almost two months while they worked their way through the list of tutorials Peter considered essential to adulthood.

El had thrown a celebration dinner when they were done and declared the last time that many things in their house had worked was when they had moved in.

When they had finished the last project, Neal had suggested to Peter that he might have supplied him with valuable skills that he could use in his next heist, and almost fell out of his chair laughing when Peter very seriously informed Neal it was a risk he was willing to take, because every functioning adult should be able to change a sink. He'd answer to the Bureau if he had to.

Those had been good days. Neal still grinned proudly whenever he washed his hands in the kitchen.

He flipped to the next drawing, this one of he and El and a whiteboard that El had scrounged up from the basement. Neal was leaning forward, carefully studying the area of the diagram she was pointing to.

She had dug it out and declared class was in session after he whined to her that Peter had used yet another baseball analogy he didn't understand.

When he asked why in the world they had a full sized whiteboard in their basement, she told him Peter had used it as an evidence board from before he was the head of department when he used to do more work at home.

She had laughed when she informed him the last case that had decorated the board had been Neal's own. She had laughed harder when Neal asserted it was the perfect to board to learn on then, because obviously the only reason Peter had caught him was because he used that lucky whiteboard.

She spent almost an entire Saturday afternoon explaining the mechanics of baseball to him while Peter had been back at Quantico for a training course.

After the whiteboard lesson had come a Saturday night and almost an entire Sunday full of baseball movies, and by the time Peter got home, Neal could keep up with any baseball concept Peter threw at him.

Neal shook his head. Those lessons still came in handy almost every week.

He flipped to the last drawing. He sat on the Burkes’ couch, framed on either side by El and Peter, a blanket shared between all three. Satchmo was sitting on his feet, pressed back against his leg as close as he could get, the tv casting a flickering light on their happy faces.

Huh. Maybe June was right, Neal eventually decided. He smiled as he shut sketchbook and slid it onto the bedside table, lowering his bed back to horizontal as his exhaustion caught up to him.

He never should have doubted her.


	13. Sharing and Caring

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, and thank you so much for the kudos and comments! 
> 
> As a note, this chapter also contains slight season four spoilers!

When Neal made his way back to consciousness, the first thing he heard was the soft sound of a page turning.

He smiled sleepily without opening his eyes, basking in the quiet calm of the room.

The sound had come directly to his right, where Peter had been asleep earlier.

Good, he was awake then, and hopefully when Neal mustered the energy to open his eyes, he would also look less exhausted.

Neal sighed happily, turning his face toward the warmth of the sunbeam streaming in through the large window beside his bed.

He was mildly surprised Peter didn't react to him being awake, it must be a good book he was reading.

He lay with his eyes shut for another long minute, soaking in the warm sunlight and the feeling of safety of having Peter sitting next to him.

Another minute passed and Peter hadn't turned the page. Either he was re-reading part of the page or he was staring creepily at Neal because he had realized Neal was awake. Maybe he was trying to be quiet in case Neal fell asleep again.

Neal turned and cracked his eyes open, squinting at Peter. He was looking at something, but it wasn’t a book, it was... Neal blinked the sleep out of eyes to see clearer, it was a sketch pad.

_His_ sketchpad he realized with a jolt. Peter was looking at _his_ sketchpad, the one he had just filled with domestic drawings of the Burkes and their criminal friend. 

He tried to jerk upright to grab it, but as he began the movement, he was abruptly reminded he had broken ribs and collapsed back with a pained moan.

"Neal," Peter called, alarmed, his attention immediately snapping to the groaning man on the bed.

Peter's gentle hands pulled him into a seated position that took the pressure off his ribs and the pain started to fade as he lay back against his raised bed, panting.

When the pain subsided to a manageable level Neal turned his head and glared angrily at Peter.

"What are you doing?" he demanded.

"Uh," Peter was visibly taken aback, "looking at your sketchpad?"

"Why?" Neal snapped, holding his hand out expectantly.

Peter looked confused as to why he was in trouble, but gently set the sketchbook in Neal's outstretched hand.

Neal pulled it in to his chest and clutched it tightly. After a moment of consideration he slid it onto the bedside table, out of Peter’s reach.

“Why?” Neal demanded again, still glaring fiercely.

"Uh, because I saw you had drawn in it and I wanted to see what you drew?" Peter asked more than he answered.

"Sketchpads are private, Peter!" Neal shot back, almost yelling.

He knew he was being unreasonable, but his sketchpads had always been like his diary, and considering the last entry, he didn't want Peter poking through it.

"Oh," Peter said, wide eyed and shocked. "I -, I did not know that."

"You're a White Collar detective! How do you not know that?" Neal demanded.

"I'm an agent because I'm a good detective," Peter argued, "not because I have any artistic talent! How was I supposed to know that?"

"You could have used your good detective skills to figure it out!"

Peter opened his mouth to yell something back, but took a deep breath in and closed his eyes instead. When he opened them again he was much calmer, and he took another deep breath before he spoke.

"I'm sorry, Neal. I shouldn't have poked through your stuff. If it helps, I only saw the first three pages."

Neal let the apology hang in the air, willing himself to calm down and accept it. He knew he was being dramatic, but his panic was slow to fade and he couldn't seem to make himself be rational.

"Ok," he said eventually. "I'm sorry too, I think the pain meds have made me a little touchy."

"The pain meds, the pain, the trauma, the unintended privacy breach, you have plenty of reasons to be defensive, Neal, don't be sorry," Peter replied, hesitantly patting his shoulder.

Neal appreciated the gesture, but Peter retracted his hand again almost instantly, clearly unsure if Neal wanted to be touched after they had just fought.

Neal missed the warmth of Peter's hand but relaxed further into the bed, glad Peter wasn't mad at him. His eyes slipped shut as the pain and anxiety depleted his already low energy reserves.

"I really am sorry," Peter said quietly after a long pause. "I didn't realize sketchpads were private, I wasn't trying to snoop."

Neal cracked an eye open to peer at him.

He did look sorry, his eyes downcast, his brow furrowed. For a split-second Neal was tempted to draw this out, it wasn't often Peter Burke was openly apologetic, but then he thought about everything the man had done for him in the past week alone and disregarded the idea.

"It's ok, Peter, really," Neal absolved with a tired smile, "I overreacted."

The relief that broke over Peter's face seemed to lighten the room, and Neal was glad he didn't try to milk the opportunity.

"They were really good," Peter offered hesitantly.

Neal felt a flush of pleasure and hoped he wasn't blushing. There Peter went again, admiring Neal Caffrey originals.

"You liked them?" he asked, more hesitantly than he had intended.

Peter relaxed at the calm reaction, a smile growing on his face. "Yeah I did, you're an amazing artist, Neal."

"Mozzie doesn't think my original work is all that good," he admitted quietly.

Maybe these new pain meds affected his filter too, he normally would never have admitted something like that. Or maybe it was the way Peter admired his art, and the conversation he had just had with June, and the longing for reassurance from a father.... It was probably the pain meds.

"Mozzie," Peter said firmly, leaning forward to look Neal in the eye, "values art based on the price tag, and it's hard to understand the dollar sign on priceless."

Neal's eyes filled without his permission and he bit his lip to keep them from spilling over.

Peter smiled as he stood and sat on the edge of Neal's bed, gently pulling him into his side in a loose hug.

Neal closed his eyes and burrowed into Peter's chest, deciding he could blame his reaction on his medications if he was made fun of later.

Peter's arms, mindful of Neal's ribs, tightened as he pulled him in closer.

"Neal," Peter said, lightly resting his head atop Neal's, "I have seen a lot of artists' work in my time in White Collar, a lot of masterpieces, but I have never seen anyone in my entire career who can create anything even half as amazing as your work."

Neal couldn't stop the tears from spilling over, so he hid his face further in Peter's shoulder instead.

He knew Peter would notice, Neal's back was shaking and shuddering while Peter's shirt was becoming steadily wetter, but maybe he would be kind enough not to point it out.

"I'm serious, Neal," Peter went on, rubbing Neal's back and squeezing him tighter, but otherwise not making a big deal of his tears, "the things you make are the best art pieces I've ever seen. The painting of El you made me is my favorite piece of artwork throughout all of history, hands down. That painting of Paris you were working on last week is amazing, even that cursed Chrysler building painting was incredible. If you started selling some of your original artwork, I think I could understand why people spend millions of dollars on art."

That statement, though appreciated, did not help Neal stop crying, and he sobbed harder as Peter rubbed his back.

Eventually he ran out of tears, but he didn't try to pull away from Peter's hug. Neal loved physical affection, and he wasn't going to turn it down if it was being offered so freely.

He sniffed, trying to subtly wipe the tear tracks away. He wasn't overly successful.

"It's the pain meds," he supplied unconvincingly.

"Ok," Peter accepted easily, rubbing a hand down Neal's back again, then back up to card through his hair.

"I'm not going to make fun of you," he added after a long moment. "I won't tease you about anything that happens while you're in the hospital, ok? That wouldn't be friendly teasing, that would be cruel. It's not fair when you're tired and hurt and sick and medicated, ok?"

Neal sank further into Peter's side in lieu of an answer, wiggling one of his arms out from between them and squeezing his handler in a grateful hug.

"We could -, we could look at the rest of them together if you want," Neal offered hesitantly.

"I'd like that," Peter said, reaching over Neal to pull the sketchpad from the bedside table and handing it to him.

Neal shifted slightly so his handler could see, glad Peter hadn't disconnected the hug.

With another moment of hesitation, he flipped it open to the fourth page, his hat hanging off his chair.

"Wow," Peter breathed. "I swear, Neal, sometimes I think your drawings might be photographs, how do you do that?"

He leaned in closer, carefully studying the picture, admiring the beams of sunlight from the out of frame kitchen window and the intricate wood grain Neal had sketched in.

"I can't even draw a stick figure," Peter said lightly, "and you can draw chairs so realistic people might try to sit in them."

Neal smiled and pushed deeper into Peter’s hug, grateful for the compliment, but unsure of how to respond.

Peter huffed a laugh.

“What’s on the next page?” He asked, giving Neal a situation he knew what to do with.

Neal flipped the page, watching Peter’s face as he looked at the picture of Neal and Elizabeth.

Peter’s smile softened, warm and fond as he looked at the new picture.

“Ah,” he said quietly, “my two favorite people.”

Peter was going to make him cry again, and Neal was not hydrated enough for that nonsense. Not to mention, he was going to get some serious emotional whiplash when he was out of the hospital and Peter was Peter again. Neal closed his eyes and tried to soak up as much of the open affection as he could while he still had it.

Peter gently pulled the sketchbook from Neal’s hands so he could look closer.

“Wow,” he whispered, “how in the world did you draw this? This is amazing Neal.”

Peter was silent for a long minute as he looked at all the details of the picture. Neal tipped his head up so he could watch Peter’s face, enjoying the open wonder on it as Peter kept looking at the drawing.

“I remember when you two rolled pasta,” Peter said, handing the sketchpad back to Neal. “That was delicious. Maybe when you’re feeling better you two could make it again?”

Neal laughed. “I’m down if Elizabeth is,” he agreed, turning the page to he and Peter grilling.

Peter didn’t say anything, and Neal turned to look at his face, confused and a little worried he didn’t like it.

Peter had one of the warmest, fondest looks on his face Neal had ever seen as he gazed at the drawing.

“That was a great day,” he murmured, a gentle hand pulling the picture closer so he could look at the details.

“It was a great day,” Neal agreed, relinquishing his hold on the sketchpad and resettling to watch Peter’s face.

Peter studied the picture for a long moment, smiling wider as he noticed more details.

“I love it,” he told Neal as he handed it back.

Neal felt a blush rising in his cheeks and ducked his head to hide it.

“Thanks,” he whispered gratefully as he flipped the page.

  


Peter chuckled as he took in the picture of El taking care of Neal when he was drugged. 

“At least you sent the faxed distress call,” Peter muttered in fond resignation as he shook his head. “But to be fair, you wouldn’t have _needed_ to if you had -”

“Anyway,” Neal said pointedly, cutting over the lecture and flipping the page. “Here’s the next one.”

Peter chuckled and sent him a knowing look, but allowed the distraction, looking down to study the drawing. 

“Wow, Neal,” Peter shook his head in amazement. “If I had even a hundredth of your skill....” he trailed off as he looked at the drawing of he and Peter installing the new sink.

Neal smiled, a warm feeling spreading through his chest. He appreciated Peter using the word skill instead of talent.

Neal would take compliments in any form he could get them, but when people told him how talented he was, it made him want to tell them he wasn’t born able to draw and paint like he could. He wanted to tell them how hard he worked for his abilities, how many hours and years he had devoted to his craft.

“This is amazing,” Peter said, pointing to the floor around the sprawling legs. “You even remembered what tools we needed. And the way you can draw things so realistically.... I can almost feel the sunshine from the windows...”

“Thanks,” Neal smiled, appreciating the specific compliments rather than just the sweeping ‘you’re a good artist’ most people gave when complimenting art.

Peter chuckled fondly. “I still can’t believe you didn’t know how to change a sink.”

“When would I have learned to change a sink?” Neal asked derisively, leaning further into Peter as he felt his ever present exhaustion creeping back in. “I grew up in witsec. There wasn’t a lot of time to do home projects in between moving six times before junior year.”

Peter went tense under him, and Neal’s eyes snapped open as he realized what he had said.

“You were in witsec?” Peter whispered in shock.

Neal shrugged, starting to feel a little awkward. “My dad killed a cop and turned state’s evidence on a mob family, that makes a lot of people mad.”

“Oh,” Peter said quietly, hugging Neal tighter. “I’ll save the rest of my questions for when you’re not on pain meds, but we’re gonna talk later, ok?”

Neal nodded gratefully, glad Peter wasn’t going to press for more details immediately.

“I had a lot of fun teaching you,” Peter admitted quietly after a pause, refocusing on the drawing.

“It truly surprised me, but I had a lot of fun learning,” Neal replied tiredly, not bothering to take the sketchpad back, twitching a hand to indicate Peter could turn the page instead.

“She dug out the whiteboard?” Peter laughed.

“Yeah. We also decided that the only reason you caught me was because of that magic whiteboard,” Neal informed Peter, smiling up at him with an impish grin. 

“You decided,” Peter corrected fondly. “I have the utmost faith in my wife that she did not agree with you.”

Neal mock scowled at him. “She so would have if I had actually tried to convince her.”

Peter laughed again, bright and free, and Neal soaked up the sound.

“I thought you basically turned yourself in?” Peter reminded him.

“That too,” Neal nodded in wide eyed faux sincerity.

Peter chuckled, shaking his head with a mildly reproving look as Neal continued to blink innocently at him. 

“Alright, oh innocent one, what’s next?” Peter asked 

Neal attempted to hide a jaw-cracking yawn behind one hand, his other waving permission for Peter to flip the page. 

Peter’s eyes softened, watching Neal force his half-mast eyes back open. 

“One more, then we’ll call it quits for today,” he decided for them both. 

Neal shrugged, sinking further into Peter’s side and burrowing his head into Peter’s shoulder in lieu of a pillow. 

“It’s the last one, anyway,” he mumbled, trying to stay awake. 

“That worked out,” Peter commented lightly, flipping the page and smiling down at the image of the Burkes and their consultant on the couch for a movie night. 

He studied the picture for long enough that Neal almost fell asleep, warm and safe and comfortable, curled into Peter’s side.

“These are amazing,” Peter said eventually, closing the sketch pad and sliding it onto the bedside table. “ _Amazing_.”

“Thanks, Peter,” Neal muttered, grinning widely even as his eyes refused to open. 

“Should I lay your bed back down?” Peter asked, making a move to get up. 

“No,” Neal whined, almost asleep, clutching at the shirt fabric closest to his hands and yanking him back. “Comfy.” 

Peter huffed a laugh, but resettled where he had been. 

“What am I supposed to do while you sleep, huh?” Peter asked quietly. 

“Comfy,” Neal reiterated firmly, unmoved by Peter’s argument, falling asleep just as he felt Peter’s hand start to card through his hair. 

It really was nice to have an FBI dad, he thought to himself as he let sleep pull him under.


	14. Visiting Friends

Neal blinked and pulled his bed into a more upright position as he woke up, early morning sun streaming in through the window.

He looked around the room and smiled fondly when he saw that Peter was asleep, leaning onto the side of the bed, his head pillowed in the crook of his arm.

Neal huffed a soft laugh, but was saved from deciding what to do by the door quietly swinging open.

Neal smiled, expecting his nurse, but his expression froze into something a little more shocked when he saw Hughes come through the door.

“Sorry, sir, Peter’s -,”

Reese waved him off and sat in the seat beside the bed.

“I came to see you, Caffrey.”

Neal did _not_ appreciate having this conversation while his heart rate was displayed for everyone to see, and he hoped Hughes had missed how the tempo of beeps had picked up as he said that.

Hughes cast his sleeping agent a fondly exasperated look.

“At least he’s not attacking everyone who opens the door anymore,” Hughes deadpanned.

Neal didn’t know what to say to that.

“Did he ever tell you how hard he had to fight to get your deal approved?” Reese asked idly as the silence drew on.

Neal shook his head mutely.

“Yeah, he was a real pain about it,” Hughes informed him. “I must have denied his request at least two dozen times before he got his way. Then he had to argue for weeks with DC, I was afraid he was going to get my best agent fired, but somehow he convinced them.” 

Neal listened in amazement. He’d had no idea it wasn’t as simple as filling out a request form and going to a meeting or two to get approval.

“Not to mention the radius,” Hughes lamented, shaking his head. He raised a hand to pinch the bridge of his nose to stave off the remembered headache. “The Marshals decidedly did not want you to have one, did you know?”

He quirked a curious look at Neal, who shook his head again with wide eyes.

“Yeah, they wanted you to stay in the holding cells in the Bureau, but Peter wouldn’t hear of it.”

He rolled his eyes in exasperation and turned to shake his head at his sleeping agent again.

“You should have seen him. He shot regulations at them like they were bullets. Prisoners are required access to an outdoor area for at least an hour a day, they’re required access to exercise equipment, required to be provided with acceptable entertainment, the list went on and on until the Marshals let him have the radius just to make him stop.”

“He never told me he had to argue for the radius,” Neal said softly, looking at his sleeping handler and feeling yet another tidal wave of affection for the man crash over him.

Hughes huffed a laugh.

“No, he wouldn’t have...” Hughes conceded with a wry grin. “Argued for a lot more than that. Normal prisoners don’t get alcohol, they don’t get to stay in contact with their old associates, or keep thousands of dollars in cash stashed around their apartments, all of which you can do only because Peter Burke is a colossal pain in the ass when he wants to be.”

He sat back in his chair, studying Neal for just long enough to make him nervous before he went on.

  
  
“I told him,” Reese sighed, looking at the sleeping man in resigned exasperation, “I told him that having a CI was like the responsibility and exhaustion of having a child, but I was trying to scare him off, not warn him to have adoption papers ready.”

“Uh,” Neal protested, eyes wide in alarm. He may be working his way up to excited about his parental revelation, but he was decidedly _not_ ready for Hughes to notice the same things he had just realized. “Peter’s not my -”

Reese cut him off with a stern look before he could finish and Neal’s mouth snapped shut.

“I warned him over and over again that it was going to be career suicide when you cut your anklet and run, but he assured me you wouldn’t do that.”

Hughes clasped his hands in front of him and leaned forward slightly in his seat to look Neal in the eye.

“Don’t mess this up,” he said seriously. “I mean it, Caffrey, don’t mess this up, it would break his heart. Not to mention how difficult he would make my life. He almost rioted when Fowler arrested you over that pink diamond fiasco, it is nightmare fuel to think what he would do if someone tried that now...”

Hughes trailed off, sitting back and shaking his head with a slight wince as he thought about it.

“He was convinced you were good,” Hughes went on, sending Neal a considering look, “and it took me a while to see it, but I’m starting to believe he might be right.”

Neal stared at him with wide eyes, trying to formulate a response and failing miserably.

“You’re still a giant pain in my ass, though,” Hughes informed him bluntly.

Hughes’ phone let out a soft chime and he glanced down at it, sighing in disgust.

“Looks like twenty minutes is too long to go without a crisis,” he muttered in annoyed explanation to Neal.

Hughes shook his head and gave Neal another assessing look. 

“I need to get back to the office, I only came to make sure you’re ok. You are ok, right?”

“Yes, sir,” Neal said, glad to finally have a question he knew what to do with, “getting better everyday.”

“That’s good,” the ASAC nodded, standing up and shooting his agent one more fond look. “Peter would be unbearable to live with if you weren’t. Bye, Caffrey. Feel better.”

Hughes gave a small, twitched wave and he was out the door, leaving Neal in a stunned silence.

“I really wish you were awake,” Neal told his sleeping handler, “because I’m not entirely sure that wasn’t a painmed-induced hallucination.”

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“Ok,” Peter said, “and -“

“Peter,” Jones interrupted reassuringly, “I can handle it. Go. Get the house ready, pick up the medicine, we will be ok. I won’t leave before he wakes up, I’ll tell him where you went, we will be fine.”

“Ok,” Peter nodded. “Yeah, of course you will. Ok.”

Jones laughed at his nervous boss. He watched Peter pack up the duffel bag he’d been living out of for a few more minutes before he restarted the conversation.

“So he’s gonna go to your house for recovery? Did you make him beg or did you crack the first time he asked?”

Peter snorted, ducking under the chair to pick up a pair of socks that had gotten kicked under it the day before.

“No,” he said, grabbing the pencil that had apparently rolled under the chair as well, “the idiot didn’t ask, he thought he would go to June’s and handle it all himself even though June is out of town for the week and he’d be the only one in the house.”

Peter stood up, shaking his head as he turned to face his agent.

“You should have seen El when she heard that,” he chuckled. “She put an end to that idea, only took one of her patented disapproving looks for him to fold and agree this was a better plan.”

Jones laughed quietly, glancing fondly at the bed before he turned back to his boss.

“Well, at least he’s smart enough to listen to Elizabeth even if he doesn’t listen to us,” Jones said wryly.

Peter huffed a laugh as he zipped his bag and slung it onto his shoulder.

“True,” he agreed. “You’re sure you’ll be -”

“Peter,” Jones cut over him in laughing exasperation. “I can watch a sleeping troublemagnet. We will be fine, he will be fine, go. Get out of here.”

Peter quirked a smile and nodded, waving as he pulled the door open.

“With traffic and everything, I’ll probably be back in about five hours,” he called, waiting for Jones’ nod before shutting the door with a quiet click.

Jones laughed quietly and shook his head.

“Your FBI dad is a _mess_ ,” he fondly informed the sleeping consultant.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

“Peter?” Neal rasped, blinking the sleep out of his eyes.

“Nope,” a voice on his right said, and Neal’s eyes snapped open, panicking slightly as he tried to figure out who was in the room with him.

“Just me, Neal,” Jones chuckled, picking up Neal’s cup to refill it from the pitcher in the corner. “Peter’s gone to pick up your prescriptions and make sure the house is ready for you leaving tomorrow.”

“Oh,” Neal said, adjusting his bed up to a sitting position as he considered Jones’ answer.

“Do you know if he’s coming back today?” Neal asked in what he hoped was a casual, nonchalant tone.

“Yeah,” Jones said, setting the pitcher back and walking back to the bed. “He should be back in a few hours.”

"Oh, ok,” Neal said, accepting the glass held out to him. “Thanks, Jones."

"No problem, man, that’s what friends are for.”

"Friends?” Neal asked in another feigned casual tone before he could stop himself.

Jones shot him a disbelieving look.

“Yeah, friends,” he confirmed. “You think I tell just anybody about how much I hate the van?”

Neal laughed.

“Yeah, I do,” he said with a grin.

“Ok,” Jones conceded with a chuckle of his own, “yeah, I do, but I mean it, we’re friends, man. Of course we’re friends, did you not know that? I thought you were smart.”

“I am smart!” Neal insisted indignantly.

“Hmm,” Jones hummed, unconvinced. “Clearly.”

“Not my fault you’re confusing,” Neal grumbled, trying to stop smiling long enough to pretend to pout.

Jones laughed.

“Me?” Jones scoffed. “I have been reliably informed that I am the most straightforward guy around.”

“Oh yeah?” Neal mocked. “Who told you that, ex-girlfriends?”

“Yes, actually,” Jones said with a self-satisfied smirk. “It is consistently in the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ speech.”

“Wait, you actually get ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ speeches?” Neal asked, perking up in interest.

“Yeah, Caffrey, some of us get dumped,” Jones said, rolling his eyes. “I’m sure you can’t relate.”

“Oh no, I get dumped,” Neal corrected, “but I normally get ‘it’s not me, it’s you’ speeches.”

Jones laughed loudly in surprise, laughing harder at Neal’s pseudo-sincere nod.

“So how does it work when you’re not the problem?” Neal asked curiously. “Do they find time to hang out with you to tell you they’re too busy to hang out with you?”

“Well, yeah,” Jones chuckled. “It usually ends up being one of the nicest dates of the relationship though, so there’s that.”

“Nicest?” Neal asked, brow furrowed in confusion.

“Oh yeah, they’re full of compliments on why it’s not me. Apparently I’m nice, and hot, and responsible, and funny, and laidback, and straightforward is what it boils down to, but they’re busy, or moving, or have a family crisis that takes up too much of their attention to be in a relationship.”

Neal shook his head in wonder. “Only you, man, only you. I normally get slapped when I get broken up with.”

Jones laughed, but before he could respond, Diana knocked and entered the room.

"Hey, Caffrey," Diana greeted as she hung up her jacket.

“Diana,” Jones cut in before Neal could return the greeting. “Did you know this idiot doesn’t think he’s friends with us?”

Jones swiveled and squinted at Neal. “Unless it was only me you didn’t think you were friends with?”

“Uh,” Neal slumped a little on the bed. “No, it wasn't.”

“Caffrey, are you serious?” Diana demanded. "And to think, I used to think you were smart!"

"I _am_ smart," Neal whined indignantly.

"Obviously not," Diana said, crossing her arms and arching an eyebrow.

"Am too," he muttered, barely resisting sticking his lip out and pouting.

"No, see I don't believe that anymore,” Diana informed him, “because if you were smart you would have noticed we were friends. We've been friends for years and you haven't noticed, idiot."

"You see, this right here," Neal argued, "this isn't overly friendly."

"It's a form of affection," she told him unapologetically. "You're welcome."

"How am I supposed to tell when you're being affectionately mean to me and when you're just being mean to me?" he asked.

"You'll figure it out," she said, unconcerned by his predicament.

“Before or after you murder me?” he asked indignantly.

She smirked at the implied accusation.

“Preferably before,” she answered easily. “I am kind of fond of you, after all.”

“Who can tell?” Neal asked sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

“Literally everyone,” Jones informed him with a chuckle.

Neal scowled at him.

“That is not at all true,” he argued, a distinct whine in his tone. “You’re a lawman, you’re not supposed to lie.”

Jones snorted. “Not according to Mozzie,” he said, grinning widely.

Neal’s petulance cracked into a fond chuckle as he nodded his agreement.

“Well,” he relented, “you’re not wrong.”

“I never am,” Jones smiled smugly, sending Diana and Neal into peals of laughter.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

Well over an hour later, Diana’s phone chimed a soft reminder.

“Sorry, Neal,” she said, glancing down at her phone screen, “I need to get some paperwork to the courthouse, so I need to head out.”

Neal nodded his understanding with a warm smile.

“Thanks for coming by,” he said brightly. “This was fun.”

“It was,” she agreed, patting his leg one more time as she stood to leave. “I’ll come by Peter’s house to see you,” she promised.

“Ok!” Neal chirped happily.

Jones looked up from a message he had been reading on his phone.

“Sorry, Neal, but I think I may need to leave as well. Saunders needs me to go fight with NYPD over some of the evidence in lockup.”

“Ok,” Neal said easily, smiling brightly at them both. “I’m glad you guys came.”

“So are we,” Jones said, gathering his bag. “Text me if you need anything, ok?”

Neal smiled fondly.

“Ok,” he agreed.

Jones studied his expression for any hint of deception.

“You promise?” he asked, squinting at Neal’s chuckling face. “Promise you’ll text or call me if you need anything?”

Neal offered Jones his pinky with a cheeky smile.

“Promise,” he confirmed.

It was offered as a joke, but Jones hooked the pinky and stared Neal in the eye.

“Ok, you _promised_ ,” he reiterated seriously, ignoring Diana as she snorted in the background.

Neal’s smile brightened even further as he nodded sincerely.

“Yep,” he agreed, “I promised.”

“Alright,” Jones said reluctantly, moving toward the door. “Text me if you need anything!”

He opened the door, added one last, “You promised!” and made himself walk out the door, Diana chuckling at his side.

“You’re getting to be as bad as Peter,” she told him once they were out of earshot of Neal’s room.

“I am not!” Jones defended indignantly.

Diana sent him an unimpressed look.

“You made him pinky promise to tell you if he needs anything,” she reminded him.

He opened his mouth to argue but she carried on before he could.

“You were sending a death glare at your phone for daring to deliver the message that made you leave.”

He scowled at her for several long seconds as he tried to come up with a defense.

“You don’t know that’s why I was glaring,” he said eventually.

She laughed brightly, unbothered by his scowl.

“Oh yes I do,” she refuted.

“Fine,” he relented, a little testily, “counter argument, I can’t be as bad as Peter because it is physically impossible for a human being to reach the levels of overprotectiveness that Peter has achieved in regards to Neal Caffrey.”

She pursed her lips as they rode down the elevator.

“Yeah,” she sighed when the elevators opened on the ground floor, “you’re right. Fine. You’re almost as bad as Peter,” she amended.

Jones shot her an amused glance as he led them out into the parking lot.

“Almost is relative, I’ll accept almost.”

She rolled her eyes, but grinned as she waved goodbye.

Jones unlocked his car and turned the transmission, but didn’t put it into drive yet.

He pulled out his phone and drafted a text to Peter, sending him an update.

‘Hey Peter, I’m heading out, Saunders needs me to fight with NYPD over evidence. Neal’s awake, stayed awake for over an hour. I told him you were coming back, he’s doing fine. Text me if you need me to help with anything.’

‘Ok, thanks, Jones,’ Peter sent back a few seconds later.

Jones chuckled at the speed his boss had replied, and shook his head, pulling out of the parking lot and wondering idly if Peter would quit what he was doing to return to Neal’s hospital room since he knew Neal was alone.

  
He scoffed, flicking on a blinker to merge onto the highway. Honestly, how could Diana think _anyone_ could be as protective as Peter?


	15. Handling the Situation

When Peter quietly swung the door open, Neal had both feet on the ground, preparing to stand, but froze when he caught sight of his handler. 

“Neal?” Peter asked, a note of warning clear in his tone.

Neal slumped back in his bed, annoyed, but Peter noticed an odd glimmer of relief in his eyes.

“Neal, why were you planning a hospital break when your anklet is off?” he prodded, trying to keep his temper.

“I wasn’t trying to run,” Neal insisted earnestly. “I was -, I -, I just wanted to make sure the door opened,” he finished in a small voice.

Oh. A sudden realization hit Peter. Of course Neal would be worried. With the IV lines, he was effectively tied down, the door was shut, and in the middle of the day it had probably been a while since someone had come into the room.

He nodded his understanding as he turned to close the door, leaving it open just a crack.

When he turned to face his CI, Peter didn’t miss the way Neal gazed at the door in relief.

Peter walked to the window and unlatched the locks, pulling it up a several inches and then closing it again, only re-latching the lock closest to Neal. 

“I’ll ask El to stop by the Bureau and get your phone when she visits today,” he said casually, trying not to make a big deal out of the situation.

Neal didn’t answer.

When Peter looked up he was met with two wide, wet eyes staring at him as if he had hung the moon.

He blushed and looked down, studying his scuffed shoes as a wave of affection for his CI rolled through him.

“Here,” he said, holding up the bags he brought as a distraction, “food.”

“Food!” Neal repeated, his eyes excited as he took in the label of his favorite Chinese place on the side of the bags Peter held.

“Yep,” Peter confirmed, peering into the bags and then offering one to Neal. 

“Thanks,” he grinned, accepting it eagerly. 

“No problem,” Peter smiled back, watching Neal excitedly pull it open with the same fervor of a child opening a present on Christmas morning.

“So does Regular Peter return when we step out the hospital doors or drive off the lot?” Neal asked curiously without looking up from his exploration. 

Peter quirked an amused eyebrow.

“Regular Peter?”

“Yeah, you know,” Neal said, digging all the way down to the bottom of the food bag to survey all of the amazing food Peter had brought him. “Teasing, no uninitiated physical contact, vague grumpiness, certified curmudgeon. You know, Regular Peter.”

“I’m not grumpy,” Peter scowled at him, plucking the fork out of Neal’s hand and claiming it as his own in punishment for the insult.

Neal sent him an exasperated look. “Kinda proving my point for me, grumpy gills.”

“Whatever,” Peter brushed off, grabbing his box of takeout out of his own bag and moving his bag to the floor so he could hold the container easier. 

“What do you mean no physical contact?” Peter asked, pausing as he opened his box to look at Neal.

“You know,” Neal said, confused by the question, “you don’t like being touched.”

“What?” Peter asked, looking just as confused as Neal felt. “I don’t mind being touched. I pat your shoulder all the time, why do you think I don’t like being touched?”

Neal stared at him, setting his food down on his lap. “You told me not to touch you on the Ghovat case, remember?”

“What?” Peter asked, bewildered. “No.”

“You did,” Neal insisted, “we had just made that breakthrough, and you told me not to touch you.”

“Oh,” Peter rolled his eyes, “Neal, you were slapping my shoulder like a two year old on a sugar high while I was still trying to convince the Bureau you could be mature and professional. I meant ‘do not celebrate like a child’, not ‘don’t ever touch me again’.”

“Oh,” Neal said, stunned.

Peter rolled his eyes and finished opening his box of food, settling in to eat.

Neal pulled his food out and started to eat as well, considering what Peter had said.

“So, when did you convince them I’m mature and professional?” Neal asked eventually.

Peter snorted and shook his head.

“I didn’t, they gave up,” he informed Neal with a smirk.

“What?” Neal demanded, folding his arms over his chest and pouting. “I’m mature and professional.”

Peter laughed and reached in the bag at his feet for the small container of sweet and sour sauce he had seen Neal eyeing, setting it on the bedside table rather than making Neal overextend his healing ribs. 

“Hmmm,” Peter hummed, unconvinced.

“I am!” Neal insisted, sinking down further on the bed as his pouting intensified.

“Of course you are, Neal,” Peter humored him, and while Neal didn’t appreciate the condescending tone, he’d take the agreement.

“Glad we agree,” he conceded as he pulled the sauce off the table and tried to pry the lid off.

Peter grinned and rolled his eyes, but merely shook his head instead of continuing the banter, opening the container Neal was struggling with and settling in to eat his own meal. 

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

As they finished their food and started cleaning up the mess, Neal eventually finished waxing poetic on the joys of food from the outside world, particularly any food that wasn’t jello. 

Peter smiled in fond amusement as he finished, but let them lapse into a comfortable silence as he ferried the trash Neal gathered for him to the trash can in the far corner. He made a mental note to take the trash bag out of the room and down to the dumpster outside later so it didn’t completely smell up Neal’s room, not that Neal would be inhabitating the room for much longer, but still.

  
  
Neal opened his mouth, but seemed to immediately change his mind, his jaw clicking shut, and Peter cast him a questioning glance. 

“Well,” Neal started, responding to the non-verbal prodding in a voice that was uncharacteristically hesitant as he handed Peter the last of the trash, “can I ask a question while Nice Peter is here and won’t make fun of me?”

“Of course you can,” Peter said, casting Neal a concerned look as he took the empty container Neal held and carried it over to the trash can.

Peter walked back over, pulling his seat up close to the bed before he sat in it.

“What’s wrong, Neal?” he asked seriously, leaning forward and folding his hands on the bed in front of him.

Neal looked at Peter’s hands and had to actively resist the urge to reach out and hold one. He needed to get control over this need for physical comfort, pretty soon it would all be gone, and it would make the transition so much harder if he didn’t stop himself from begging for it at every turn.

Peter was Peter though, and of course he caught the longing glance Neal tried to hide.

Peter smiled and unfolded his hands, holding one out to Neal.

Neal smiled weakly and took it, internally scolding himself on how much harder he was making things on himself by getting used to receiving hugs and warm hands at every turn.

“What’s wrong, Neal?” Peter asked again, warm and reassuring. Neal kind of hated that tone and how effective it was at making him feel safe enough to spill all of his problems to Peter whenever the man asked.

“I just -, I had a question, and it’s not a big deal, I know that sometimes the higher ups tell you -, or -, or Hughes, he’s terrifying, and -,”

“Neal,” Peter cut him off gently. “It’s ok, bud, just ask.”

Neal nodded and dropped his eyes to his lap to pick at his bed sheet with his free hand.

“Could I only go undercover with you from now on?” he asked quietly, studying the loose thread poking out of his sheet. “I mean, Diana and Jones are ok, too, I guess, but can I -, can it be only for operations you’re in charge of? I mean, I know -“

“Neal,” Peter cut him off again, squeezing his hand. “Yes, I’ll make sure.”

Neal’s eyes flew up to look at Peter’s face, trying to determine if Peter was only saying that to make him feel better, or if he actually meant it. 

He did mean it. Peter looked back steadily, holding Neal’s gaze easily as Neal searched for any hints of doubt or deception.

“Neal, you didn’t have to ask,” Peter said, “I’m never letting you be put in that situation again, I can promise you that.”

“You can?” Neal whispered, desperate for reassurance.

Peter brought his other hand up to hold Neal’s hand as well.

“Yes, I can.” Peter said firmly. “Neal, I’ll protect you, I promise.”

Neal breathed out the tension that had been thrumming through him, melting back into the bed.

“Thank you,” he breathed, closing his eyes as the full weight of his relief hit him. He hadn’t realized quite how worried he had been until Peter promised him he didn’t have to be.

“Thank you,” he repeated emphatically.

“Don’t thank me,” Peter scoffed. “I never should have let you get taken _this_ time, let alone have it even be a question of another time.”

Neal cracked an eye open to peer at Peter in disbelief.

“What?” he asked. “No, Peter, this wasn’t your fault.”

Peter’s expression closed, slamming up a mask that he seemed to think actually kept Neal from seeing the crushing guilt in his eyes.

‘Handlers,’ Neal thought to himself as he rolled his eyes internally, ‘when will they learn?’

“You’re in the hospital,” Peter reminded him, leaning back in his seat as if to telegraph he was done with the topic. He didn’t let go of Neal’s hand, though, and Neal was grateful for the concession.

“You need to focus on getting better,” Peter went on. “We’ll -“

“It wasn’t your fault,” Neal said firmly over Peter’s avoidance attempts.

“I’m not supposed to stress you out,” Peter informed him, completely ignoring Neal’s interjection.

"It wasn't your fault," Neal repeated, looking Peter in the eye.

"If the nurses come in and find -“

“It wasn’t your fault,” Neal insisted again.

Peter abruptly deflated, apparently realizing Neal wasn’t going to let the topic go.

“Actually, it is,” Peter said quietly, wiping a hand down his face and looking suddenly exhausted.

“No,” Neal countered, “it’s not.”

“It is,” Peter muttered.

“How?” Neal asked pointedly, raising an eyebrow at Peter when he lifted his gaze to look.

“I -,” Peter started, words catching in his throat.

Peter’s gaze dropped to the floor beside Neal’s bed.

“I knew it was going to go wrong,” he whispered, “and I didn’t stop it.”

“Peter,” Neal started, waiting for Peter to look up at him.

Peter didn’t, still staring resolutely at the floor with tight shoulders.

Neal squeezed his hand and tugged lightly.

“Peter,” Neal called again, ducking his head in an attempt to catch Peter’s eye.

He had forgotten he had broken ribs, and that ducking down wasn’t an advisable move in such a condition. His ribs reminded him with a sharp flare in his side, and he gasped, bracing them with his free hand.

That got Peter’s attention, and all of a sudden he would look at Neal exactly when he didn’t want to be looked at. Typical.

“Neal, are you ok?” Peter asked, concerned, using his free hand to brace Neal into a straighter sitting position.

“I’m fine,” Neal tried to wave off.

Peter shot him an unimpressed look.

“Yeah, excuse me if I don’t believe you,” Peter said sarcastically.

“Ok fine, Faithless,” Neal shot back before an idea hit.

“Fine, yeah, they hurt a lot,” Neal relented, hoping Peter didn’t catch on before he finished laying the trap. “It’s kinda awkward, but could you help me with something to make them stop hurting?”

“Of course,” Peter said instantly. “Anything, what do you need me to do?”

“I need you to talk to me about this and realize it wasn’t your fault,” Neal said, successfully springing his trap on the unsuspecting Peter.

“Neal,” Peter scolded.

“You said anything,” Neal reminded him.

Peter rolled his eyes.

“I agreed to help your ribs feel better. Talking about this won’t make your ribs feel better.”

“Are your ribs broken?” Neal asked. “No,” he answered for Peter, “then you don’t know what makes them better.”

“We could call Nurse Matt,” Peter suggested. “He could tell us that’s not going to help your ribs at all.”

“Oh please, he would agree with me, and you know it,” Neal said confidently.

Peter pursed his lips, unable to dispute that.

“Please, Peter?” Neal asked, widening his eyes and just barely pushing his bottom lip out. “I want to talk about this.”

Peter let out an explosive sigh.

“Fine,” he sighed again. “Brat.”

Neal put a hand to his chest in mock offense.

“Peter!” he gasped, “I thought you were being nice to me while I’m in the hospital!”

“There are exceptions to every rule,” Peter said, the corner of his mouth trying to pull up into a smile.

Neal grinned in triumph, savoring his victory.

“Fine, talk,” Peter said grudgingly.

“It’s not your fault,” Neal said again, beginning to feel like a broken record. That was ok though, sometimes Peter needed repetition to beat things into his thick head.

“We’ll agree to disagree,” Peter sidestepped.

“No,” Neal said firmly, “we’ll agree this wasn’t your fault.”

“It was though,” Peter said, sounding pained.

“How?” Neal demanded. “How were you supposed to know? You told me about your bad feeling, I chose not to do anything. You weren’t involved in running the operation, -“

“I should have been,” Peter said, cutting him off.

“Peter,” Neal rolled his eyes, “Hughes assigning me to another agent isn’t your fault. You didn’t do anything wrong, but you did a hell of a lot of things right. June told me about how hard you looked. You found me. Again. Just in the nick of time, too.”

“You shouldn’t have ever been in that situation,” Peter insisted.

“No,” Neal agreed. “Agent Warner put me in that situation, and my favorite FBI agent, Special Agent Peter Burke, got me out.”

Peter swallowed hard and looked down again, but for once had nothing to say.

Neal carefully moved himself to the far edge of his bed, then tugged on Peter’s hand, widening his eyes and looking pleadingly at Peter when he hesitated.

It took his handler less than a second to fold under Neal’s silent begging, and he quirked a tired, fond smile and sat on the bed in the opening Neal made for him, pulling the consultant into a hug.

Neal burrowed further into Peter’s chest, one hand coming up to grip Peter’s shirt, and he sighed happily when he felt Peter’s arm settle more firmly around him.

“You came for me,” Neal said quietly, without looking up. “I knew you would because you always come for me. Every time, without fail. You come when I get myself into the mess and you come when San Francisco agents do, but do you know when you haven’t had to? You’ve never had to save me from when you got me into a mess, because you never have, Peter.”

“I’ll always come for you,” Peter said, not quite agreeing but Neal would take it for now.

Neal curled further into Peter’s side, soaking up his warmth and steadiness. Since he hadn’t kept himself from asking for physical affection like he had planned, he was determined to make the most of every hug Nice Peter gave him.

Neal heard a faint click and tilted his head, trying to pinpoint the noise. Was that... heels? Doctors and nurses don’t wear heels.

Whoever was coming was heading their way, but Peter was in the room and awake, so Neal wasn’t terribly worried about it.

The heels came up to the door and stopped, the door knob slowly turning. The door swung silently inward, and both Peter and Neal watched curiously to see who it was.

Elizabeth’s eyes peeked around the door, smiling and walking in when she saw they were both awake and she didn’t need to try to be silent.

“Well, hello!” she said happily, walking over to give Peter a peck on the lips and run a hand through Neal’s hair.

“How are my boys doing today?” she asked, sitting in Peter’s recently vacated chair.

“Good question, how are we doing, Neal?” Peter asked, looking down at him.

“Hmm,” Neal hummed with a tired smile, “we’re great.”

Elizabeth smiled even brighter. “Good. You look tired, sweetie, do you need me to come back later?”

“No,” Neal said, shaking his head, “please stay. I’m always tired. You’d think I could stay awake longer than an hour or two at a time by now....”

“Hey,” El said, leaning forward to take his hand. “You’re healing. That takes a lot of energy.”

Neal shrugged, but smiled at her, blinking slowly as he tried to stay awake.

“Oh, hon,” Peter groaned, “I forgot to ask you if you’d bring Neal’s phone. It’s at the Bureau. Could you bring it by next time you visit?”

Elizabeth grinned, letting go of Neal’s hand to grab the purse at her feet, digging through it for a moment until she found what she was looking for.

“Way ahead of you, honey,” she smiled, holding Neal’s cellphone out to him.

He smiled gratefully, taking the phone and holding it in the hand that found its way back to clutching Peter’s shirt.

“Thank you,” he said, “how did you know to get it?”

“I made an offhand comment to Diana about picking it up from June’s, and Diana said she was pretty sure it was at the Bureau, so I swung by.”

“My wife, the mind reader,” Peter said, impressed.

El smiled and dug through the purse again.

“Here’s your charger,” she said, setting it on the table beside the bed.

“Thanks, El,” Neal whispered, trying to stay awake for her visit. It was hard though, when Peter was warm and solid beside him, and he and El started talking, their voices bright and happy, adding to the growing feeling of safety in the room.

Neal shook his head slightly, trying to wake himself up, but El stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

“Sweetie,” she said when Neal looked up at her in question, “go to sleep, it’s ok, you need to rest to get better. I’ll visit you again later tonight, I promise.”

“Ok,” Neal whispered gratefully, “thank you,” and let himself be lulled to sleep by happy sounds of the Burkes talking about Elizabeth’s day. 


	16. Picturing Perfection

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for the wonderful reviews and comments, I love and appreciate every one of them!

“Neal!” Peter called down the stairs, “Jones just texted, he and Diana are coming to see you, is that ok?”

“Yes!” Neal called emphatically, perking up as he looked forward to their visit.

“Ok,” Peter responded, “Jones said they’re a minute or two away.”

“Great!” Neal called up to him.

Neal heard their cars pull up barely thirty seconds later, grinning in anticipation of having visitors.

“Boss told us that we are not to make fun of you for anything you said when we visited you in the hospital," Diana informed Neal as she and Jones let themselves in, "but that no longer applies from here on out, so watch yourself, Caffrey.”

"Noted," Neal chuckled.

Diana and Jones nodded their approval at the acceptance and hung up their coats before coming further into the house.

"So, um, you guys came from the office, right? Is, uh, is Agent Warner sticking around?" Neal asked in a failed attempt at nonchalance.

"Oh, definitely not,” Jones smirked.

“No?” Neal asked, unable to hide his relief.

“No,” Diana said firmly, grinning. “He wasn’t even capable of being in a room with Peter for more than thirty seconds after Peter was done with him. He flew back to San Fran over a week ago.”

“After Peter was done with him?” Neal asked in confusion.

“Wait, have you not heard?” Jones sounded like Christmas had come early.

“Heard what?” Neal asked, looking between the two eagerly grinning agents.

“Did no one fill you in on what happened when you were gone?” Diana asked, excitement growing.

Neal’s brow furrowed as he looked between them, trying to remember anything in Peter’s retelling that would have caused this reaction.

“Uh, Peter gave me a run down, and June filled me in on what he didn’t...” he trailed off, wondering if they were so giddy over Peter refusing to go home and how that related Warner.

“Oh no, she wouldn’t have known this one, and Peter wouldn’t have told you,” Diana said.

“After they took you," Jones said, sitting in the chair facing Neal, "Peter gave Agent Warner a truly impressive cold freeze silent treatment, and the idiot was too stupid to realize that was the best he’d get out of Peter. Warner kept trying to talk to him, and two days in, he confronted Peter about it in the middle of the bullpen while Peter was trying to get coffee.

He was telling Peter off about how they should be civil, and can’t they just get past this? Oh man, Peter just let loose on him, right there in the middle of the bullpen. Told him he was useless, and his work was meaningless compared to yours. He verbally eviscerated him, it was glorious.”

“Oh, Neal,” Diana added in agreement, “it was beautiful. I have never seen him that angry. He straight up murdered Warner, Agent Warner is just a walking corpse now, and Peter isn’t even sorry.”

“Oh, come on,” Neal argued in delighted disbelief, “Peter doesn’t do public displays of anything, let alone a public display of ritual murder to defend my honor.”

“Oh he did this time,” Jones said with a grin. “I didn’t know he could be that eloquent, actually. It was _glorious_ is what it was. I’m fairly certain I watched Agent Warner’s soul leave his body, along with all of his hopes and dreams.”

“I think Varma was testing the new spy-cam from tech," Diana added, "I’ll check with her to see if she got it on video. If she didn’t, we’ll rack our brains and bring you some quotes of what he said next time we visit.”

“I’m holding you to that!” Neal said, already looking forward to their next visit before they had even left.

Jones laughed, glancing at something out the window.

“I think the little guy is outside,” he informed them with a smirk.

A second later, Elizabeth came down the stairs, waving at the three in the living room.

"Mozzie just texted me he was here," she said in explanation, pulling the door open to reveal Mozzie on the doorstep.

“Come on in, Mozz,” Elizabeth said warmly.

“Um, no," he refused. "No, there are three suits in there. I’m not going in until at least one leaves and restores balance to the suit-con ratio.”

Jones laughed. “I think that’s my cue. Unfortunately I didn't have time for a long visit, I have to get a warrant request to the DA before five today. I just wanted to come make sure you were doing ok and Peter wasn't feeding you deviled ham."

"You are a true hero," Neal told him fervently.

Jones chuckled.

"Feel better, Neal," he said, swinging his coat on.

“I’ll head out with you,” Diana said, standing up as well. “I’ve still got work left at the office that needs to get done today. Feel better, Caffrey, we miss you in the bullpen.”

Neal beamed at her as he waved goodbye to them both.

"I'll be back before you know it," he promised.

"You'd better be," Diana called as she walked past Mozzie and out of sight.

With a satisfied smile, Mozzie walked into the house and El closed the door behind him, shaking her head in vaguely exasperated amusement.

“Well, now that we’ve fixed the ratio,” El said with fond sarcasm, “I’m going to leave you boys to talk, I’ll be upstairs.”

"Ok, Mrs. Suit, it's good to see you."

"It's always good to see you, too, Mozzie," she called as she climbed the stairs.

“You’re looking better,” Mozzie said, sounding pleased.

“Looking better?” Neal asked in confusion. “You haven’t seen me since before I was taken.”

“Au contraire, my friend,” Mozzie smiled knowingly. “ _You_ have not seen _me_ , but _I_ have seen _you_.”

Neal stared, his dread growing as he caught on to what Mozzie was implying.

“Elizabeth sent you pictures?” he guessed in dazed horror.

“Yes!” Mozzie confirmed happily. “Mrs. Suit sent me pictures.”

“Let me see them,” Neal demanded, wondering if he could be quick enough to delete them off Mozzie’s phone before his friend could stop him.

“I thought you would ask to see them,” Mozzie said, reaching into his inside coat pocket.

“Here,” he pulled half a dozen printed pictures out and handed them to Neal.

“Why can’t I look at them on your phone?” Neal asked, taking the pictures with a dubious look.

“Because you’ll try to delete them while you have it,” Mozzie said confidently, chuckling at the scowl Neal sent him. “It would be but a fool’s errand regardless, I’ve already made copies on several thumb drives and hidden them around the city.”

“Has anyone ever told you you’re paranoid, Mozz?” Neal asked, scowling.

Mozzie shook his head, raising a finger as he proclaimed, “‘one’s mind is working at its best when one is paranoid’.”

“Ok, thanks, Banksy,” Neal scoffed, finally looking down at the first picture.

He and Peter were both in it, asleep. Peter was sitting mostly upright on Neal’s hospital bed, Neal laying across his chest, clutching his hand. Peter’s head was tipped forward, resting on Neal’s as they both slept.

There was photographic evidence of this? Neal would need to start planning the heist to reclaim all copies of these pictures immediately. For once, Peter would probably be in support of a heist plan. He might even help.

He flipped to the second and his resolve to find and destroy them all redoubled.

In the picture, Neal was asleep on the bed, head turned toward a sleeping Peter who was slumped against the edge of Neal’s bed. Peter’s head was pillowed in his own arm, clutching Neal’s hand.

Neal knew where almost all of Mozzie’s safe houses were, how hard could breaking into all of them really be?

He flipped to the next one. At least this one he was hardly in.

Peter stood in front of his bed, protective and imposing, which was at odds with the exhausted confusion on his face as he tried to register who had entered.

Neal quirked a reluctant grin at the memory of Peter’s dedicated protection.

He shook his head, reminding himself the pictures needed to be destroyed, and flipped to the next one, groaning as he took it in.

Peter was sitting on the side of the bed, facing a protesting Neal. Peter looked fondly exasperated while Neal had his arms crossed and his head turned away defiantly, refusing to look at Peter as he held out a green jello cup and a spoon for Neal to take.

Neal may not approve of the picture, but he stood by his stance on lime jello. It was disgusting.

He flipped to the next picture in the stack.

They were both awake in this one as well. Peter was sitting on Neal’s hospital bed with Neal tucked under his arm, reading the latest Sports Illustrated El had brought him while Neal quietly sketched on his sketchpad.

Neal couldn’t believe his friends had betrayed him like this. He expected better from Mozzie.

He flipped to the last one in the stack. Neal was asleep, tucked under Peter’s arm once again while Peter talked about something, not paying attention to the camera. Neal recognized the position as the day El visited them right after Neal asked to work only with Peter, and wondered if this was punishment for falling asleep during her visit.

That settled it, he decided. The first thing he was going to do when he could walk without wincing again was plan a ‘reclaim these pictures’ heist.

He looked through them again.

“Mozzie, why would you not burn these immediately?” Neal asked in horror.

“There’s something rather endearing about them,” Mozzie informed him, “once you get past the moral bankruptcy of the badge of the g-men, of course.”

“Mozzie,” Neal chided, “I know you have a vendetta, but is it really fair to call Peter morally bankrupt?”

“No, I will reluctantly admit that the Suit is... acceptable. No, I was referring to the ‘agency’ he works for,” Mozzie explained with sarcastic finger quotes. “Everyone knows they’re just the frontmen to hide the government science experiments being conducted right under our nose!”

“Ok, Mozz,” Neal sighed, putting a hand up to stem the flow of conspiracy theories he knew would follow, “I’m too tired and medicated for this right now, ok? Can you just get rid of the pictures?”

“Uh, no,” Mozzie said, as if Neal had just suggested something preposterous. “What part of ‘I think they are endearing’ did you not hear? Besides, June wants copies.”

“You showed these to June?” Neal demanded, sitting up straighter in alarm.

“Pfft,” Mozzie scoffed. “No, Mrs. Suit sent them to her directly, but she asked if I could print them off for her.”

“And you did it?” Neal asked, horrified.

“What do you think you’re holding?” Mozzie asked pointedly.

Neal held the pictures tighter, clutching them to his chest as if Mozzie were planning to snatch them back at any second.

Mozzie rolled his eyes and pulled out another stack of pictures from his coat. “Fine, keep those, I’ll give her the second set I made.”

Neal’s hand darted out and snatched those as well, adding them to the pile he was clutching away from Mozzie’s potential reclaiming efforts.

Mozzie rolled his eyes again and took a step back, producing a third set once he was out of Neal’s reach.

“Mozzie, why?” Neal whispered in betrayal.

“Because June,” Mozzie said simply.

“Mozzie,” Neal complained, wishing he could think clearly enough to come up with a reason to convince Mozzie to destroy the evidence immediately.

"Oh, hey," Peter called, coming down the stairs. "Diana, Jones, could you -,"

He stopped talking, registering Diana and Jones had left.

“Damn,” he muttered, “missed them.”

He turned and offered a small wave to Mozzie.

“Hey,” he said, catching sight of the pictures Mozzie was holding.

“What are these?” he asked, plucking them out of Mozzie’s hand before he could answer.

“ _They_ are none of your business, Suit!” Mozzie shot back angrily as Peter flipped through the pictures.

“What are these?” Peter repeated, this time in a horrified tone that echoed Neal’s.

“He’s going to give them to June!” Neal tattled, seizing his chance to confiscate them from Mozzie by proxy.

“Yes, I am,” Mozzie said defiantly, reaching out to take them from Peter.

“What?” Peter asked in alarm, pulling the pictures to his chest to protect them from Mozzie’s determined fingers.

“No,” Peter said, glaring as much as he could while he deftly avoided Mozzie’s grabbing hands.

Mozzie managed to snag a corner before Peter yanked them back out of his grip, and Peter held them high above his head, out of Mozzie’s reach, then able to concentrate on the verbal argument as Mozzie scowled up at them.

“Why?” Peter demanded.

“Because June,” Mozzie answered, sniffing in annoyance as he gave up his attempts to get the pictures back and walked toward the door.

“Fine, I think I’ve suffered enough government oppression for one day. I’ll visit you later, mon frer, when your place of residence contains less bureaucratic tyranny.”

“Bye, Mozzie,” Neal grinned fondly.

Mozzie twitched a wave, glaring at Peter before transferring a slightly less potent glare to Neal.

“Goodbye, Neal. Feel better, and next time don’t get the Suit to do your dirty work, it’s unbecoming. And besides, it doesn’t matter,” he scoffed, pulling out another set of photos and waving them over his head to show Peter and Neal as he walked out the door.

“The day I have a normal conversation with that man is the day pigs fly,” Peter said, shaking his head as he stared at the door Mozzie had just left through.

“Well, pigs could fly,” Neal started, setting the pictures on the table in front of him. “You know, if you believe Mozzie -“

“I don’t,” Peter said, cutting Neal off before he could launch into whatever conspiracy explained flying pigs. Probably illicit government science experiments, but it could just as easily be a theory on what the government was putting in the general populace’s food supply, and Peter could feel a headache brewing.

Neal laughed at him, and Peter sent him a light scowl as he added his pictures to the stack and collapsed into the chair across from his consultant.

“You know, he’s right about some things,” Neal said, laughing at the unimpressed expression on Peter’s face.

“Really?” Peter asked in sarcastic disbelief. “Like what?”

“Well,” Neal said offhandedly, “he told me today that you were acceptable, which is true, and also high praise coming from him.”

“Did he?” Peter asked, back straightening as he discreetly preened at the compliment.

Neal snorted. “Yeah, he didn’t want to, but he admitted it. Out loud and everything.”

“Huh. Well as far as short little criminals go, I guess he’s acceptable too,” Peter allowed graciously.

“I’m sure he’ll be thrilled,” Neal deadpanned, hoping he remembered to pass that along next time he saw Mozzie.

“He should be,” Peter nodded in mock seriousness, making Neal laugh again.

“So, book or movie?” Peter asked, standing up and moving to the kitchen to refill Neal’s water.

“I saw a movie pop up on the suggested list, ‘Now you see me’, have you heard of it?”

“No, I haven’t,” Peter said, reappearing in view with two glasses of ice water in hand.

“It’s a movie about a group of magicians,” Neal said, gratefully accepting the water Peter offered him and sitting up more so Peter could sit at the end of the couch.

“They rob a bank while they’re on stage. Think we can solve the case before the movie does?” 

“Oh you can bet on that,” Peter said confidently, smiling as he found the remote and brought up the movie.

“This one?” He asked, bringing up the bio.

“Yep!” Neal chirped happily, sinking into Peter’s side as Peter’s arm automatically resituated around him, pulling him closer.

“El!” Peter called up the stairs. “We’re watching a movie if you want to join us, hon!”

“What movie?” her voice floated down to them.

“Now you see me!” Neal answered, accepting the blanket Peter handed him and spreading it out over his lap.

“Oh! Wait for me, I want to see that one! Be down in just a sec,” she called.

“Ok!” Peter yelled back.

El appeared on the stairs as quickly as she promised, hurrying over to the couch with a grin.

“I saw this one pop up on the suggested, it looks good,” she said, gently picking up Neal’s feet and wiggling under them to claim her end of the couch.

“Hand me a blanket, hon?” she asked, stealing a sip of Peter’s water that sat on the coffee table in front of them.

Peter passed one over, chuckling as Satchmo came trotting out of the kitchen to sit in front of Neal.

Elizabeth spread her blanket out, resituated herself, and reached across Neal’s back to hold Peter’s hand.

“Ok, I’m ready,” she said, “let’s see if we can solve it before they do!”

Peter started the movie and Neal settled in to watch, one hand venturing out of the warm blanket to pet Satchmo.

Between the three of them, he was confident there was no case they couldn’t solve. They’d have it solved in forty five minutes.

He should have known better. They solved it in twenty.


	17. Presenting the Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the kudos and reviews!!! They were the motivation I needed to finish editing this chapter, and I love them so much, thank you :) 
> 
> Thank you all for sticking with me, we’re so close to a finished story! One more chapter and a completed fic, here we come!

“What should I do, Satchmo?” Neal asked, looking around the room for inspiration.

Elizabeth was at work, and Peter was on the back patio grilling he and Neal hamburgers for lunch. Neal couldn’t wait, Peter’s hamburgers were always delicious in a way Neal had never been able to replicate.

A quiet buzz pulled his attention to his phone.

A text notification. He opened it, grinning when he saw Diana had started a three way text thread with herself, Neal, and Jones.

‘Good news or bad news?’ she asked with no context.

That wasn’t ominous at all.

Neal squinted at his phone.

‘Bad news first’, he typed out, deciding to just get it over with.

Jones responded, ‘Zoe wasn’t testing the camera, we don’t have video.’

Neal felt himself start to pout and didn’t bother making himself stop since there weren’t any other people in the room. He was fairly certain Satchmo wouldn’t tell on him, and he was supremely disappointed by the lack of video evidence.

‘ :( :( :( ’ he typed and sent, hoping it conveyed the depth of his dismay.

He reread Diana’s text. Oh, yeah, there was good news!

‘What’s the good news?’ he asked when they didn’t volunteer it unprompted.

There was a several minute delay before Diana sent, ‘We are currently having a meeting in the middle of the bullpen with all of the NYWC to remember what Peter said.’

Neal stared at that sentence, his giddy excitement growing as he thought about them all having a group meeting to recount Peter’s lecture, picturing what Peter would say if he walked in on that. Surely between all of them, they’d be able to remember the basics, he thought, eagerly awaiting the transcript they compiled.

‘That’s AWESOME!’ he typed out. ‘Do you think you’ll collectively remember most of it?’

There was another long delay before Diana sent, ‘This is going great, I think between all of us we’ll have it verbatim.’

Neal beamed at his phone.

‘Apparently it’s extremely memorable when Peter loses his cool and kills someone,’ Jones sent a few seconds later.

Neal reread that, still not convinced they weren’t blowing Peter’s reaction out of proportion.

“I’m still not sure I believe you that Mr. Cool-Calm-and-Collected Burke verbally murdered someone.’

‘You’ll believe it when we finish writing this up,’ Diana’s text promised.

‘No embellishing!’ Neal commanded.

‘Pinky promise,” Diana sent back almost instantly.

‘I swear on my hatred of the van that we will not add anything we don’t remember him saying,’ Jones added.

‘Alright, I will tentatively believe you,’ Neal allowed magnanimously.

‘Great,’ Diana sent, ‘we’ll text you when it’s done.’

In a show of perfect timing, Peter swung the back door open, holding a plate of hamburgers.

“Lunch in three minutes!” He called, bending to grab things out of the fridge.

“Awesome!” Neal called back, sniffing the air in anticipation. “They smell great!”

Peter grinned at him. “I’ll be over in just a sec to help you get up,” he promised, heading back to the kitchen after he deposited buns and an impressive array of condiments on the table.

Two trips to the kitchen later, and Peter had a delicious looking lunch laid out.

He helped Neal to the table, and Neal immediately set about crafting his burger from the wide variety of toppings Peter had brought over as Peter poured a bag of chips into a bowl for them to share as a side dish.

“Sorry, Satch,” Neal said as the dog laid his head on Neal’s leg, “I’m not sharing this one.”

Satchmo whined, but curled up at Neal’s feet when Neal failed to produce any scraps for him.

The burgers tasted just as delicious as they smelled, and the chips disappeared alarmingly fast.

Neal’s phone vibrated when he was almost done with his food, and he turned it over, hoping it was a text from Jones or Diana.

He grinned. It was.

‘We want to be there when you read it, we’re heading your way!’ Diana texted.

Neal looked at his phone in confusion.

‘You’re leaving now? It’s two o’clock,’ Neal pointed out.

‘We’re taking a late lunch,’ Jones sent.

Neal chuckled down at his phone.

“Something funny?” Peter asked, looking up from his plate.

“Just Jones and Diana,” Neal answered easily, setting the phone down and turning back to his lunch. “They’re taking a late lunch to come visit.”

“Oh,” Peter said, eyebrows raising in surprise. “I hope they don’t expect the lunch part here, I only made enough for us.”

“I’m sure they can drive through somewhere,” Neal assured, waving Peter back to his seat when he made a move to stand to go into the kitchen.

Peter considered that for a moment before nodding his agreement and settling back down to eat his food.

It didn’t take them long to finish, and Peter helped Neal resettle on the couch just in time to hear the car pull up.

“Do you have it?” Neal demanded as soon as he saw them come in the door.

“Yep!” Diana called, waving the papers to demonstrate.

“What are those?” Peter asked, bemused by the giddy excitement of the other three.

“Just a report for Neal about what happened when he was gone,” Jones said, a mischievous glint in his eyes.

“A report, huh?” Peter asked, stepping closer to Diana to read the papers. “What specifically are you reporting that has him so excited?”

“Oh nothing, Boss,” Diana said impishly, “just the exact words of you dressing down Agent Warner in the middle of the bullpen, that’s all.”

Peter’s eyes widened as the other three laughed, and he snatched the papers out of Diana’s hands before she could stop laughing enough to stop him.

“No!” he commanded, pointing an authoritarive finger first at Diana, then at Jones.

“No,” he repeated, this time including all three of them in his stern look. “I’m taking these and shredding them and then burning them. Also, I’m going to go take a shower while someone is here to babysit Neal. Have fun not talking about anything that happened in the bullpen when Neal was not present.”

And with that, he turned on his heel and strode up the stairs.

Neal stared sadly after him, wilting as the papers disappeared from view.

Diana let the silence hang for a long moment before she turned to Neal.

“We thought that would happen,” she said conspiratorially, “so we emailed it to my email. Here,” she added, pulling out her phone.

Jones bat her hand down from where she was offering the phone to Neal.

“No, we have to read it to him,” Jones insisted, “for effect!”

She chuckled, but didn’t argue, settling on the coffee table in front of Neal and waiting for Jones to sit next to her so they could share her phone screen.

Neal grinned. With both of them facing him, he felt a bit like an audience in a theater, waiting for a show to start.

Apparently he and Jones were thinking the same thing, because Jones cleared his throat dramatically, lifting his chin regally as if he were making an announcement to a high-end theater.

“Today, I will be playing the role of Special Agent Peter Burke,” he proclaimed, “and Diana will be playing the role of Walking Dead Man, Agent Warner.”

Diana nodded pretentiously, giving a small bow in acknowledgment.

“Are you ready?” Jones asked Neal, accepting the phone Diana handed him.

“Oh, I am so ready,” Neal grinned, leaning back into the couch cushions as he prepared to witness the best show of his life, and with that, they launched into their dramatic retelling of the legendary event.

Ten minutes later, Neal clapped loudly as they finished, applauding longer when they stood up and took bows for their performance. He had been right, that was the best show he had ever seen in his life, and he had the best handler in the world.


	18. Finding Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone, I finally have the last chapter done! I didn’t mean for it to be so late, life got really crazy. Finally got everything straightened out, though, so I hope you enjoy the last chapter!

Neal could feel Peter watching him fondly as he checked his appearance in the mirror in the Burkes' living room, but he ignored his handler, adjusting his suit jacket and hat angle before deciding his appearance was acceptable.

"Are you ready to go back?” Peter asked, when Neal turned to face him.

“As I’ll ever be,” Neal smiled brightly, actually looking forward to getting back to business as usual.

Peter gestured for him to raise his leg and lift the pants leg, and even the click of the anklet’s lock felt like a piece of normal sliding back into place.

Neal was grateful for the generous recovery time Peter had convinced the Bureau was necessary, but he had found himself full of excess energy in the past few days, and he was itching to get back into the swing of things.

Neal gave Satchmo a last pet goodbye and led Peter to the door, waiting on the stoop as Peter turned to lock it back. Using the time Peter was distracted, Neal slid his sleeves up to check on his almost healed wounds out of view of his handler.

Neal wanted to keep tabs on his various injuries, making sure they didn't scar or get infected again, but Peter's mood always abruptly dipped when he was reminded of his consultant's injuries, so Neal tried to check on them in the few instances Peter wouldn't notice.

Peter saw them, of course. He was hyper-vigilant about cleaning Neal's wrists and other scrapes, making sure the bandages were fresh and sterile, but he wasn't as worried by the possibility of scarring as Neal was and only made a point to look at them at the scheduled cleaning times.

Neal was pleased to see they were fading as the doctor promised. The doctor claimed he would heal without noticeable scarring, but Neal hadn't been as convinced in the first few days.

Peter unlocked the car, and Neal bent to slide into the passenger seat without any pain, his mood brightening even further at the reminder that his ribs had healed and all his aches and bruises had faded.

"Back to work," Peter grinned at him, turning the key and putting the car into drive.

"Back to work," Neal agreed brightly, clicking his seatbelt on with a bright smile.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

"Neal!" Rodriquez called excitedly, catching sight of him as he walked through the office door Peter held open for him.

"Emilia!" he returned just as enthusiastically, which seemed to be the cue to start a round of welcome back hugs and back pats from everyone in the office.

Neal was beaming by the time he made it to his desk several minutes later, so many people between him and it that he didn't notice the balloons and vase of flowers until he was standing directly in front of it.

The agents had tied a small rainbow of balloons to his chair with one large one in front reading 'Welcome back!' in big, bold letters.

Neal spun back around to beam at the room.

"Thank you," he said sincerely, feeling like he may float away from his happiness at the visual proof that they had missed him as much as he had missed them.

"Hughes grumbled,” Diana confided, "but he didn't actually make us take any of it down, so I think it's safe to say he missed you too. He even signed your card," she added, nodding to the card Neal hadn't noticed on his desk.

"Thanks," he told the room brightly, "I didn’t even notice the card yet. It's perfect, thank you."

"Alright, back to work," Peter called, laughingly shooing agents back to their desks.

He snagged Neal's mug off his desk and returned a few minutes later, setting Neal's down while he sipped his own.

"You're on mortgage fraud for the next few days," Peter informed him, nodding his head at the stack of cases on Neal's desk. "No field cases for at least another week and -,"

"I know, Peter," Neal rolled his eyes in amusement.

His handler had been calming his own nerves of Neal going back to work by repeatedly briefing Neal on how the transition would be handled, and Neal was fairly certain he'd be able to recite it in his sleep if asked.

"Ok," Peter said, shifting his feet awkwardly, and Neal could _feel_ his handler restraining himself from asking Neal if he was ok.

"I'm fine, Peter," Neal said reassuringly, taking a long drink of his coffee. "I have my boring mortgage cases to work on, and you have all that boring paperwork to catch up on."

Peter huffed a laugh, nodding his agreement.

"You forgot the boring meetings I'm booked in," he told Neal teasingly, taking the hint and making his way to his office.

Neal shook his head fondly as Peter walked up the stairs, thinking for the thousandth time how grateful he was to have Peter as his handler.

/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/

A few hours later Neal had finished two of the cases on his desk, but picked up his card to read the handwritten messages again rather than start the third case of the day.

“Planning your land heist?” Peter asked as he walked by, grinning at Neal but not stopping for an answer as he left the bullpen for a meeting on another floor.

Neal snorted, remembering the argument they’d had just before their previous case. It seemed like so long ago.

He made a mental note to figure out how to steal land and plan the heist, just to annoy Peter. And also because he couldn’t leave his list of thefts so glaringly incomplete, but mostly because it would annoy Peter.

Although, Neal thought to himself as he looked up at the bullpen around him, maybe he had accidentally run the con already without realizing it.

He looked around the room at all of his friends who had somehow become his family, and this office that had somehow become his home.

In a blindsiding plot twist he never could have predicted, he was happy, working for the FBI. He belonged there. He was accepted there. People wanted him around and defended him when he wasn’t there to do it himself.

He even had his own desk, reserved only for him, despite having never passed through Quantico. Maybe he really _had_ stolen land after all, right in the heart of New York City. His heist record remained untarnished.

‘Peter is going to be so annoyed,’ Neal thought with a self-satisfied grin. Neal couldn’t wait to tell him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for sticking with me for this whole story! I've posted the first chapter of a sequel called "Caught You 'Cause I Could', and I'd love it if you checked it out. :)
> 
> Unfortunately, I forgot to spay and neuter my plot bunnies, and they've gotten out of hand for this 'verse.
> 
> I have a much shorter sequel completely written and _six_ other plot-lines sketched out as continuations of the verse, because my brain is a _problem_ and _cannot_ allow me to sit down and write and complete something without fifteen other plot bunnies being born along the way. I'm not sure there'll be interest for all of them, but I decided I will be publishing the sequel that is written (in the same way this one was where the plot-line is all done, the edges just need a little sanding before I can call it edited).
> 
> Thank you, thank you, _thank you_ for the continued support and encouragement, I can't tell you how much I **_truly_** appreciate it. I really hadn't been planning to publish the sequel, but I've been convinced by how kind everyone has been and I'd like to say thank you to my sister for the kind and supportive bullying (*ahem* I mean encouragement), to Caseylf123 for specifically requesting a sequel, and _all_ of the _amazingly kind_ reviewers and kudosers.
> 
> I know the story was long, but you all stuck with me, and I appreciate it. Thank you for coming along for the ride, I hope you'll check out the sequel, I promise it is muuuuuuch shorter than the original.  
> 


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